UNION members at Accrington and Rossendale College are to strike in their fight against staff redundancies.

A postal ballot of NATFHE members showed them in favour of industrial action - to start on Tuesday and finish the following Monday.

The five-day strike will affect the 90 per cent of the college staff who are union members.

Of the 105 papers issued to lecturers in the postal ballot, 54 were returned and 47 to 7 were in favour of strike action.

The strike is the latest in a number of attempts by NATFHE to prevent college management from making their 341 part-time staff redundant, and enforcing the use of employment agency ELS.

A NATFHE spokesman said: "We wanted to avoid a strike because it is no good for the students, but feelings about ELS are running so high that we expect the vast majority of teaching staff to strike."

Principal Mike Austin said the poll of staff was so low that it did not represent a true picture of lecturer's opinions.

He added: "Less than a third of college staff voted in favour of industrial action."

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