Industrial action at University regarding a new collective agreement for lecturers has left students fuming with some 6,000 of them yet to receive their annual results, the University Students Council (KSU) said today.

This number was based on a recent survey carried out by Insite - a university student organisation.

The industrial action was called by the Malta Union of Teachers and the University of Malta Academic Staff Association and affects all university students except those in the final year and junior college first year students.

Addressing a news conference at the University campus, KSU president Gayle Lynn Callus said it was "unacceptable" that students were being used as "bargaining tools".

He added that the students' body would be formally asking all involved to be represented in any future talks concerning the collective agreement. Mr Callus noted that this would give students a voice in issues concerning quality assurance and examination result deadlines.

Asked about the fact that lecturers have up to the end of this month to submit results, the KSU president argued that it made no sense to withhold results which had already been submitted.

He added that students intending to apply for Erasmus programmes would risk missing the deadline if the delays got longer.

Fourth year medicine students intending to apply for the foundation course in the UK were also at risk, he said.