University chiefs who stayed put and earned a fortune

‘Higher education pay’s gone awry’

EIGHT vice chancellors have seen their pay packages rocket by more than a third over five years, a study shows.

They are enjoying huge hikes, with three having their total remuneration deals leap by more than half in cash terms.

The list is topped by Bob Cryan, of the University of Huddersfield, whose package has soared by a staggering 67 per cent, from £219,000 in 2010-11 to £364,564 in 2015-16.

Bournemouth University’s vice chancellor John Vinney’s pay and pension award grew by 53 per cent and the overall package for Professor Paul O’Prey from the University of Roehampton rose by 52 per cent.

The statistics will reignite the row over vice chancellors’ pay at a time when workers in the public sector have suffered years of freezes. It came as universities minister Jo Johnson unveiled measures to curb deals, including making institutions publish the number of staff who earn more than £100,000 a year.

The Times Higher Education magazine analysed 114 UK universities and found that on average leaders received a 15 per cent hike in total remuneration packages including benefits and pension contributions between 2010-11 to 2015-16.

These deals rose on average from almost £242,000 in 2010-11 to just over £278,000 in 2015-16. At 44 of these, the cost of the leader’s office went up by 20 per cent – or almost 12 per cent in real terms when inflation is factored in. However, at the same time, the average pay for all academic staff dropped in real terms by 2.8 per cent from 2010-11 to 2015-16 and by 3.1 per cent for professors. Among 57 institutions where the same leader was in place for the entire period, eight vice chancellors saw their total settlements leap by more than a third.

The institutions argued that packages were not out of line for the sector. But Fred Inglis, honorary professor of cultural history at the University of Warwick, said it was ‘now clear that higher education pay has gone morally and politically awry’. And Jeremy Harris, a former director of public affairs at Oxford University and Emeritus Fellow of New College, warned that the fees regime operated ‘more like a cartel, without any real correlation between cost and quality’.