THE NUMBER of University of Ballarat workers to apply for voluntary redundancy packages is unlikely to be known until the middle of this month.The deadline for redundancy applications closed on June 30.But talks between the university and the National Tertiary Education Union have been delayed until university management processes the applications. In May University of Ballarat vice-chancellor David Battersby announced voluntary redundancies would be offered to all staff.The move was in response to an $8 million decrease in revenue the university expects to register, partly due to a drop in international student numbers.The union's Ballarat branch acting president Jason Giri said the union did not yet know how many people had taken up a redundancy package.He said the union had tried to arrange a meeting with the university for early next week but had been told the figures were unlikely to be available until the middle of July."We were hopeful were would have numbers by next week so we can assess the scale of it, but it seems that we won't have that for another fortnight," Dr Giri said.He said the delay was due to the university's process for dealing with the applications, which involves them being sited by the applicant's line manager before being passed on to a central committee.Dr Giri said the union's main concerns were to ensure the process was fair and that the workload left for workers who did not take up the offer was sustainable.A University of Ballarat spokesman said the university was in regular contact with the unions."It's important to us that we keep talking to them and we will continue to do so," the spokesman said.