skip to content
 

MEETING OF THE BOARD OF SCRUTINY

Tessa Payne
Normal
Tessa Payne
2
8
2005-01-31T15:59:00Z
2005-02-17T15:04:00Z
2005-02-17T15:04:00Z
1
739
4215
Board of Scrutiny, University of Cambridge
35
9
4945
11.5703

Clean
Clean

false
false
false

MicrosoftInternetExplorer4

st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) }

/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:"Table Normal";
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-parent:"";
mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0cm;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-ansi-language:#0400;
mso-fareast-language:#0400;
mso-bidi-language:#0400;}

MEETING
OF THE BOARD OF SCRUTINY

 

25
January 2005

 

Minutes
of the meeting held at 12.00 in the Chadwick Room, Selwyn College

 

1. Apologies

The Board received apologies from Margaret Glendenning
and John Little.

The Board welcomed Nick Downer to its membership.

 

 

2. Minutes of previous meeting

The Board agreed the minutes of the meeting on 25 November 2004.

 

 

3. Matters arising

The Board agreed to invite Andy Cliff to a
meeting of the Board and to arrange another meeting with Peter Deer.

 

 

4. Discussion on 1 February

The Chair reminded the Board that it had discussed with members of the
Council the possibility of the Board formally contributing to the Discussion on
the Annual Reports of the Council and General Board, and Financial Statements
rather than withholding comment until the Board’s Report later in the year.

 

The Board agreed that the Chair would make a speech at the Discussion on
1 February with comments on the Reports of the Council and the General Board
and the Annual Abstract of Accounts.

 

On the Report of the Council, the Board agreed to welcome (i) the reorganisation of Council Business; (ii) the promise
of a comprehensive budget for the University in 2005; (iii) incorporation into
the accounts of UCLES and the intention to incorporate CUP next year; (iv) the
increase in the money received by the Cambridge Foundation in the hope that in
the future the Foundation would be able to draw nearer to the kind of revenues
raised by competing Universities. The Board agreed to ask (i)
about progress on drawing up lines of accountability and responsibility in
relation to paragraph 2 of the Annual Report of the Council; (ii) about the
lines of responsibility around the unestablished post
of Director of Public Affairs; (iii) noted the remark that ‘there are worrying
signs that the unit of resource for the public funding of teaching will be
further reduced, despite the Government’s evident assumption that universities
such as Cambridge will implement the new fee regime’.

 

On the Report of the General Board, the Board agreed: (i) to encourage the University to act on act on IPR in
light of views of the Regent House expressed at the Discussion, and to take due
notice in same way of the new pay and grading structure; (ii) that the
Secretary would ask for the response to a HEFCE consultation document on plans
for a Leadership, Governance and Management Fund.

 

On the Annual Abstract of Accounts, the Board agreed that in the
Discussion the Chair would (i) welcome inclusion of
UCLES and the future inclusion of CUP and the trust funds in the accounts; (ii)
note that the costs of administration went up by 13 per cent last year and say
that the Board will return to this issue in its Report later in the year; (iii)
note that Board has benefited from meeting with Andrew Reid and his explanation
of the distinction between ‘big U’ (which includes UCLES) and little ‘U’(which
does not) and suggest that the University’s finances could be more easily
understood if this were emphasised in the presentation of the accounts; (iv)
stress  that the University’s underlying
operating deficit is  about £12 million.

 

The Board also agreed that the Secretary would write to Andrew Reid and
ask for further details about the rise in specific aspects of administration.

 

 

5. Response to Dr Fairbrother, Senior Bursar, Trinity College

The Board agreed that the Chair would write to Dr Fairbrother
saying hat there was no contradiction between the Board’s comments and his own
response to the report on the Amalgamated Fund, and that the Board believes that
he made an important point in the Discussion.

 

 

6. Update on HERA
and Personnel Committee

The Chair reported that after a protracted correspondence with Peter
Deer and Andy Cliff, he had received the papers for the Personnel Committee
meeting on 23 November.

 

The Chair reported that his reading of the minutes of that meeting
revealed that very little sense of the detailed responses made by different
committees and institutions in the University had been conveyed.

 

The Board agreed that David Philipson and
Stephen Cowley would read and summarise the papers
for the rest of the Board.

 

 

7. Report on meeting with the
Board of Graduate Studies

 

The Chair reported that a group from the Board would meet Laurie Friday
and Prof. Willy Brown on 8
February.

 

8. Report on meeting with the
Andrew Reid

 

Jennifer Rigby presented a report on the meeting of a delegation of
Board members with Andrew Reid on 14 January. She stressed the significance of
the rise in the annual financial deficit, particularly since non-pay related
expenditure has been flat for three years, and the depth of Andrew Reid’s
concern about the deficit. 

 

 

9. Date of next meeting

Tuesday 8 February at noon in the Chadwick Room, Selwyn College

 

 

10. Any other business

 

The Board agreed to invite the new external members of the Council to
meet it.