About 80 university staff could lose their jobs as the University of Melbourne proposes to shut down its U-Vet Animal Hospital in Werribee.
University of Melbourne Vice-Chancellor Duncan Maskell announced the proposal on Tuesday in an all-staff email and said the University’s Faculty of Veterinary Sciences will also merge with the Faculty of Science.
Professor Duncan Maskell, vice chancellor University of Melbourne.Credit:Elke Meitzel
The university will be looking to a third-party commercial veterinary business to operate from the Werribee hospital facility that has been open since 1999. They plan to shut down operations in the new year.
“The University is also exploring the potential for a third-party commercial veterinary business to operate from the Werribee hospital facility in the future. However, any decision on this is subject to the outcome of the consultation on the University’s proposal regarding U-Vet,” Maskell said in an email to staff.
The Equine Centre, a separate specialist practice, will remain open at the Werribee campus.
The National Tertiary Education Union has criticised the decision that will affect 100 staff who work at the hospital and pet owners in Melbourne’s west who have relied on the health service.
“The Werribee Animal Hospital had already been subject to $10 million in cuts by the University of Melbourne in 2021 which resulted in the closure of pet emergency services and dozens of staff redundancies. Those cuts saw an outpouring of community support for the hospital and staff with over 4,000 people signing a change.org petition to try and stop them,” said David Gonzalez, the NTEU’s University of Melbourne branch secretary.
“It’s especially devastating for our members and colleagues to learn about the proposed sale of the U-Vet hospital. Western suburbs residents have relied on the hospital’s services for their beloved pets and animals for many years and may now be abandoned by the University of Melbourne.”
Gonzalez also said the reorganisation of staff in redundancies had been too frequent, causing instability and stress.
“We’ve been fighting to get the university to come to the table to limit the reorganisation. It’s been almost every year that people are getting reorganised. The university has a history of botching this and not getting the psycho-social risk right,” he said.
“It’s just something unnecessary for the richest university in the country.”
The university said ongoing challenges including a significant fall in revenue over several years as net costs have more than doubled and restricted opening hours due to an inability to fill staff rosters for the decision.
Gonzalez said staff shortages and the restricted opening was a result of the university shutting down the emergency 24-hour care at the hospital last year.
“Staff have said they’re [University of Melbourne] the reason why there are less hours,” he said.
The University said there would be no impact on students as a result of the changes to the internal faculty structure.
“Veterinary medicine is a very important discipline and will be further enhanced by the opportunities that this integration will deliver. This will also provide an enhanced student experience due to collaboration across the disciplines,” a University of Melbourne spokeswoman said.
The spokesperson said 20 new roles including 15 academic and five professional would be available under the new proposal.
“If after consultation the U-Vet proposal goes ahead, there will be a number of job losses. (Approximately 80 roles),” the spokeswoman said.
“This is a source of great regret and we will take all possible steps to support our staff during this difficult period.”
She said staff who were not appointed to a position in the restructure would be notified of redundancy and eligible for redeployment.
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