SWINDON COLLEGE has announced another round of redundancies as it attempts to recover from a £3 million debt.

It is to lay off 10 people in a series of job cuts that has cost more than 15 per cent of its workforce.

The news, highlighted in a letter leaked to the Evening Advertiser, comes just days after the college submitted plans to move to a new £15 million campus at North Star.

Swindon College principal Mike Hopkins explained that the cuts stemmed from budget reductions and changes imposed by the Government.

But he insisted that the cuts were being made in the fairest way possible and in full consultation with unions.

Mr Hopkins said: "The college is recovering from financial difficulties and is currently running a budget deficit of a maximum of £3 million.

"Over the last two years the college management and staff have been working to ensure that our costs are in line with our income.

"I believe the staff here have been magnificent. They are committed to giving students a good deal, working very, very hard and very, very well."

Mr Hopkins was not able to rule out further redundancies but said it would depend entirely on the number of students at the college in the coming two years.

In 1993, the Government told colleges they should expand into other regions, and Swindon College set up bases as far afield as Reading and Bristol.

But when Labour took over at Westminster in 1997, it told colleges to recruit students from their own area and not to compete with other colleges.

As a result, Swindon College was forced to cut jobs as its scaled down its regional operations.

The new building at North Star is set to open in 2004.

Mr Hopkins said that if there were serious doubts over the future of the college, the Learning and Skills Council would not have contributed £5.5 million to the North Star scheme.

The financial crisis was compounded by problems at the college in tracking how many students were on the roll.

Further education colleges get their Government funding by estimating the number of students at the start of the year, and before Mr Hopkins arrived the college claimed funding for more students than were actually studying there.

This meant the Government's Learning and Skills Council claimed back £3 million in funding for the phantom students but the college insists that its current computerised admissions system means such problems will never happen again.

In the latest round of redundancies, just one job will be lost from the academic side with the majority coming from administrative posts.

Despite the cuts, the college has seen a big rise in numbers of both full and part-time students this autumn, and is desperate to recruit teachers in areas such as plumbing and health and beauty.