STAFF at City, University of London, accused management today of bullying them into breaking the national lecturers’ strike by threatening to lumber striking workers with huge legal costs.

Students being charged sky-high tuition fees at a number of universities have called for their institutions to compensate them for lost contact hours.

At City, more than a thousand students are thought to have signed a petition demanding a rebate of £1,295 for the University and College Union (UCU) 14-day strike over pensions.

The college management wrote to staff today, telling them that striking lecturers “may be personally liable for any damages” if sued by students.

“Individuals choosing to take part in this industrial action will need to be aware that City reserves the right to join an individual member of staff as a party to any claims for damages made against City that have arisen as a result of non-performance of their duties, for example, claims from students,” the memo said.

Legal sources said it was doubtful that such lawsuits could succeed. “It’s a fairly classic approach to try and scare off strikers,” one lawyer said. “Whether they’d ever get off the ground is questionable.”

UCU general secretary Sally Hunt said: “Unfortunately, some universities are choosing to take a hard-line approach to try and bully staff into not joining the strike action over pensions.

“This is utterly counterproductive and, in our experience, treating staff with such contempt only hardens their resolve.

“Instead of threatening striking staff, university leaders should be focusing their efforts on getting [management] back to the negotiating table to sort out this dispute.”

The potential of compensation claims could give the union more leverage as it battles changes to lecturers’ pensions.

But student campaigners have said the debacle demonstrates the extent to which higher education has become marketised in Britain.

National Union of Students executive member Amelia Horgan said the government and university bosses “have waged a concerted campaign not just to turn to our universities into businesses but to turn students into consumers too.”

Ms Horgan, who represents postgraduate students on the executive, said City was “deploying classic divide-and-rule tactics” in its email to staff.

“First we saw the implicit suggestion that students should receive compensation for cancelled lectures on strike days,” she told the Star.

“Then, having held down pay and repeatedly raided staff pensions, management at one institution is threatening to make lecturers personally liable. While this is highly dubious legally, it’s a disgraceful attempt to blackmail staff into breaking the strike.

“But it does highlight just how broken our higher education system is. Students and lecturers — and the many postgraduates who are both — need to stand together and fight for free, liberated and accessible education.”

Independent analysis commissioned by UCU suggests high-paid lecturers could lose as much as £200,000 a head in their retirement as a result of the pension changes.

As the pensions battle heated up today, Theresa May announced a review of post-18 education, but Labour accused her of kicking her problems into the long grass.

The Prime Minister admitted it was “clear” that Britain did not have “an education system at all levels which serves the needs of every child.” She was criticised for failing to acknowledge that her own government’s trebling of tuition fees had exacerbated the problems in higher education.

Reiterating Labour’s pledge to abolish tuition fees, shadow education secretary Angela Rayner branded the review “an unnecessary waste of time.”