More than 75,000 students have joined legal action to demand compensation of up to half a billion pounds from top universities for lost learning over strikes and Covid.
It comes as more than 70,000 academics across 150 universities will walk out this week in the largest strikes in the history of British higher education.
The number of students joining the landmark legal action by the Student Group Claim has risen dramatically from just 20,000 last year after further action was announced.
If successful, the legal action could trigger a torrent of claims from anybody who attended university after 2018 seeking an average of £5,000 per person in compensation.
More than 70,000 academics across 150 universities will walk out this week in the largest strikes in the history of British higher education
More than 75,000 students have joined legal action to demand compensation of up to half a billion pounds from top universities for lost learning over strikes and Covid
Eighteen universities, including University College London, Imperial College London and the Universities of Manchester and Leeds, have received legal letters notifying them of the lawsuit.
UCL will appear in court for the landmark hearing this week – the same day that millions of schoolchildren will be affected by over 100,000 teachers from the NEU walking out.
Lawyers for the university – which paid its vice chancellor a record £589,000 last year – are set to attempt to block the proceedings by arguing students should go through the university’s internal processes.
But lawyers for the students say this is simply a delaying tactic to avoid facing a High Court judge. They argue students deserve compensation for a ‘breach of contract’ over lost teaching by the 18 universities – who boosted their coffers by £1billion during the pandemic.
Jowita Maniak, a former crime and forensic science postgraduate at UCL, said: ‘We should have been compensated from the start. Open University, which is online only teaching, is a fraction of the price.’
David Hamon, who studied a master’s degree in international public policy at UCL, said that while he supports the lecturers’ strikes, it is wrong that students should ‘bear the burden of the disruption rather than the universities who, unlike us, have thrived financially’.
The Student Group Claim is being handled by solicitors Asserson and Harcus Parker.
Shimon Goldwater, partner at Asserson, said: ‘Students at UCL and across the country simply did not receive the service they paid for, and, like any other consumer, they deserve fair compensation for the loss they have suffered.’
