STAFF at Fife College could be facing redundancies following talks with management.

Employees have told the Press that half of the lecturers from the college's beauty department will be made redundant after an emergency meeting was held yesterday (Tuesday).

The husband of one of those affected, who wished to remain anonymous, told the Press: "My wife is very upset. She's been up all night with worry and hasn't slept.

"The Scottish Government say they care about education but all I've seen is Fife College get slashed with cuts over the past couple of years.

"Some people have been working in that department for 20 years."

Staff also say that the Fife College have told students that they cancelled all level one classes for hairdressing even though they just held an open evening to recruit for the course.

Hairdressing staff were expecting to have a meeting with management today (Wednesday) and it's feared evening classes for barbering may be cancelled too.

A Fife College spokesperson said: "We are currently in dialogue with staff from the beauty department."

Yesterday, the college said they were confident they would be able to fund an increase in lecturers' pay despite speculation that some colleges could not afford a recently-agreed deal.

Lecturers at Halbeath and Rosyth have been striking in recent months as part of a campaign for fair pay and equality in Scotland's colleges.

The industrial action caused several days of disruption for students and some even missed exams.

The Educational Institute for Scotland (EIS) union suspended further action last month when an agreement was reached with Colleges Scotland that would lead to the first payment of a new salary scale.

It is now believed that some colleges cannot afford the increases after College Scotland said that many institutions would struggle to honour the deal. 

But Fife College said they were confident they could honour it with the support of the Scottish Government. 

An EIS spokesperson said: “The Scottish Government has recently agreed to release an additional £2m to colleges and the Scottish Funding Council has subsequently written to colleges to state that there is sufficient funding in place to for colleges to honour the agreements they have made. 

"In light of this, any college attempting to justify cuts to staffing by reference to national bargaining agreements would be disingenuous. EIS policy is to fight any compulsory redundancies, and we will be offering our full support to any lecturers who are threatened with possible redundancy.”