WORKERS at the crisis-hit University of Dundee are being balloted for strike action as more than a fifth of the workforce faces redundancy.

The university was plunged into turmoil in November when its senior management team announced a £30 million deficit before resigning en masse.

Since then the deficit has grown to £35m and last month acting Principal Shane O’Neill announced 632 full-time equivalent jobs were to be axed — the university has since confirmed at a Holyrood committee — affecting around 700 members of its 3,259 workers.

Mr O’Neill had warned compulsory redundancies were “unlikely” to be avoided, infuriating an already reeling workforce and prompting Unite to launch a ballot for a strike.

Ahead of the ballot opening yesterday, the union’s industrial officer Katrina Currie demanded a Scottish government-led taskforce to examine the causes of the crisis, branding the university financial body the Scottish Funding Council’s investigation “insufficient.”

She said: “Unite has no option but to respond to the gross financial mismanagement which has shaken Dundee University to its foundations.

“Under no circumstances will we allow compulsory redundancies to take place because the workers are blameless, and they should not have to pay the price for incompetence.”

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Unite will do everything industrially, legally and politically possible to protect the livelihoods of hundreds of workers at Dundee University.

“The situation is in danger of spiralling out of control, with the very existence of the university now at risk without government intervention.

“Unite will support our members every step of the way in defence of their jobs.”

A spokesman for the university called the decision to ballot for strike action “hugely disappointing,” adding: “We will do all we can to mitigate the effects on our students of any industrial action.”