As a consequence of the serious financial position of the School of Modern Languages at St Andrews University, the four Senior Language Tutors in the departments of Spanish, Russian, German and Italian are facing imminent redundancy. We the undersigned recognise the necessity of funding cuts to the School but vehemently oppose the possibility of abolishing the post of Senior Language Tutor. Not only would this result in the responsibility for language tuituon being passed on to academic staff, increasing workload and compromising research activity in the department, but it is our belief that the nature of the work carried out by each tutor means that it cannot simply be absorbed by other staff not fully dedicated to language teaching. The School of Modern Languages consistently ranks among the highest of its kind in Britain, and first in Scotland, and we believe that while redundancies among the Senior Language Tutors will provide short-term financial relief, lasting and serious damage will be done to the quality of language tuition available at St Andrews. This will not only harm the degree prospects of current language students, but also the international status of the School and the number of future applicants to study at the university.