Letters have been sent out to an undisclosed number of staff at Warwick HRI informing them that they are “provisionally at risk” of redundancy, as the industry and government are told to put their money where their mouth is.
The research facility, part of the University of Warwick, is set to become part of a new life sciences school when it merges with biological sciences in October. There will only be 55 places for academic staff under the new arrangement, four of which will be research directors. There are 83 academic staff working across Warwick HRI and the university’s biological sciences department. Some 32 are therefore provisionally at risk, according to Warwick HRI, but there are appeal procedures.
A spokesman told freshinfo: “Warwick HRI is losing a seven-figure sum every year… The easiest thing would be to close today and save money, but we are trying to give the industry and government a chance and keep going until 2012.”
