16 January 2003 Minutes

Board of Scrutiny, meeting on Thursday 10 October at Selwyn College

Boardof Scrutiny

Minutes of the MeetingHeld at Noon on

Thursday 16 January2003 at Selwyn College

Present: Stephen Cowley, Robin Lachmann, Jack MacDonald, Timothy Milner,Christopher Forsyth, Elisabeth Leedham-Green, Susan Lintott, Oliver Rackham,Jennifer Rigby, John Spencer, Helen Thompson.

Apologies: David Howarth.

1)Minutes ofthe meetings of 5 December 2002.Draft minutes were tabled. The secretary offered to produce slightly longerversion for the next meeting. This action was agreed.

2)Mattersarising. The letter tothe Press Office concerning harassment information on their WWW site hasapparently not been sent.

Thesecretary noted that the Director of Finance had drawn his attention toinformation in the Abstract of Accounts that many of the extra academic andacademic related posts that appeared in the Allocation Report were as a resultof incorporation of Homerton staff.

3)Result ofthe ballot on the Grace on the Principal Officers. There was a discussion of the consequences ofthe Grace on two of the principal officers covering the reasons for the result.There was a discussion as to how University should proceed when, at some pointin the future, the posts became vacant.

4)Thegovernance ballot. It wasnoted that the Chairman had written to the Vice-Chancellor and Council at theend of last term. It was also noted that the Council had rearranged the datesof the governance ballot so that the ballot fell within term time. The ballotwas now underway.

5)The budgetdeficit: projected meeting with Financial Working Party. It was agreed to take up the offer ofa further meeting with Malcolm Grant. It was agreed that the Chairman and SusanLintott would seek a meeting.

6)Buildings,Graces and the Regent House. TheChairman reported that he had been informed by the Registrary that the buildingfor primate research by Experimental Psychology had already been Graced. It wasnoted that the associated Report had not been particularly informative as tothe nature of the research.

7)Programme of forthcoming meetings.

a)TheRegistrary and the Treasurer.This meeting is primarily to discuss buildings and will take place on 11February. It was agreed that the Chairman, Timothy Milner, Christopher Forsyth,Jennifer Rigby and Oliver Rackham would attend.

b)Andrew Reid(Finance). It was agreedto ask the Director of Finance to come and meet us at one of our Thursdaymeetings.

c)ProfessorBrown and Laurie Friday (BoGS).The meeting with Professor Brown will take place on 20 January. The Chairmanand Helen Thompson will attend.

d)DavidAdamson (EMBS). Themeeting with David Adamson will take place on 24 January, with the Chairman,Susan Lintott and Jennifer Rigby attending. Questions to be addressed includethe English building, the Marconi building and the issue of grey water.

e)DavidSecher (RSD). The Secretarywill organise a meeting with the Director of Research Services. Robin Lachmannand the Chairman will also attend.

8)AnnualReports of the Council and the General Board; Abstract of Accounts (Reporter No. 5908, Wednesday 18December 2002). Each of these Reports was discussed. It was agreed to raisecertain issues at the Discussion on 28 January 2003.

a)AnnualReport of the Council. Para 3:the relative roles of the Business Committee and the Executive Committee werediscussed. Para 21: it was noted that the Council was concerned about themaintenance of new buildings, but that did not seem to stop them approving newprojects. Para 24: it was agreed to determine how far the University hadprogressed in setting up a legal department. The issue of the recent publicprocurement legal case needs to pursued. Para 30: there was a discussion overadmissions policy as to whether there was a University strategic plan regardingexpansion, and as to whether the Press Office was as effective as it might be.Para 31: it was noted that although CUFS might be working in some respects, theunsatisfactory state of the Research Grants Module is very important given thelarge amount of income/expenditure of the University that is associated withResearch Grants. Para 33: the odd phrasing of the final sentence was noted.Para 38: it was noted that the Senior Academic Women’s Advisory Group seems tobe a self-selected group.

b)AnnualReport of the General Board.Para 4: there was a discussion of e-learning, and in particular thecost-effectiveness of the University’s current involvement. Para 16-17: it wasnoted that the time allocation survey results might be statistically uselesssince the meaning of University time was not defined. Para 28: apparentteething troubles with the new Endeavour Voyager system were discussed.

c)Abstractof Accounts. It was notedthat the relative rosy picture of the University’s accounts was helped by anumber of one-off items of income (e.g. a VAT refund). It was noted that whileDeloitte and Touche state that their opinion is “not qualified” they also statethat certain of the policies of the University, e.g. regarding the Press andthe Local Examinations Syndicate, mean that the financial statements do notcomply with applicable UK accounting standards.

9)Any otherbusiness. It was reportedthat there is a new Director of MISD. The Secretary will arrange a meeting. Theexistence of a risk committee was noted.

10)Date ofnext meeting. The next meetingwill be on Thursday 30 January 2003.