ABOUT 15 staff at York College face redundancy as part of a £500,000 cost-cutting plan.

The move comes after the Government placed new caps on its funding for employer training and higher education courses at the college.

College bosses said the proposals for redundancies largely involved management and business support posts, and would not impact on teaching.

They said they also hoped the majority of redundancies at the college, which moved into a new £60 million premises in September 2007, would be voluntary and not compulsory.

Principal Dr Alison Birkinshaw said: “York College is making these savings to ensure that all available funding reaches the front line, and that the quality of teaching and learning continues to be excellent. “It should be noted that these changes are not due to the college’s lack of popularity or falling recruitment.

“Last year, on the back of the College’s best-ever results and the success of its brand new building, an additional 150 students joined the College’s sixth form provision, and a record number of adults and employees have worked with the College to improve their skills.

“Neither is it to do with the new build. Indeed, the College’s running costs are less than they would have been if operations were still split across two sites.

“Applications to the college are strong and investment in our students remains a top priority.”

Despite promising that the majority of redundancies were likely to be voluntary, college bosses have distributed a document to all staff identifying the posts they propose to make redundant.

These include the head of the business development unit, two Learning Development Unit (LDU) project officers, the Information and Learning Technology (ILT) manager, the ILT projects coordinator, a health and social care tutor, an NVQ co-ordinator for health and social care, a travel and tourism tutor, the head of division for key skills, the deputy head of division for IT and computing, a senior secretary, the head of tutorial programmes and the tutor manager. However, the proposals also identify the creation of three new posts.

A final decision will be made when the consultation period ends on June 16.