Newsletter
Produced by Queen’s UCU
Issue No 1 January 2010
QUB in Surplus for 2008-09
QUB’s Consolidated Financial Statements for the year ending 31 July 2009 were presented to
Senate in November. [Consolidated means that they incorporate figures taken from the accounts of
subsidiaries such as QUBIS and the Bookshop, but these make only a minor contribution.] You
should be able to get a copy of the accounts from the Finance Office. They run to 41 pages
including the verbal description in the Honorary Treasurer’s Report and the Notes to the Accounts,
which provide useful detail. Queen’s has avoided the financial problems now facing many
institutions even in the Russell Group. On an income of about £289M we had a surplus of
£6.051M (2.1% of income). This is about half of the surplus achieved in the previous year, but it
would have been much larger but for the last minute setting aside of £9.93M to fund the Early
Retirement / Voluntary Severance Scheme which is part of the 2009 Academic and Financial Plan.
Not all flows of money appear in the Income and Expenditure Account. It shows only money flows
that related to that year and are on-going. Capital movements and advance payments for research
contracts appear in separate accounts. These account balances feed into the Balance Sheet that
depicts the wealth of Queen’s at the end of the accounting period (31 July). Thus the surplus from
the Income and Expenditure account is only a small part in the annual change in the Balance Sheet.
So while the surplus was £6.051M, the Balance Sheet increased by £18.277M to £321.107M.
You must look at both figures when judging the financial health of the University. However,
because Assets are entered at historic cost and are then depreciated, their true value is usually
considerably more. Our buildings and equipment have a book value of £253.234M but an insurance
value close to £800M. The Reserves are the more liquid part of our assets. These dropped from
£78.318M to £75.578M. They would have increased but for the growing hole in the Retirement
Benefits Plan pension fund for non-USS staff.
Total income increased by 11.8% to £288.937M. Income from research grants and contracts has
increased by £8.121M to £59.303M. The contribution to indirect costs increased to £10.1M,
representing a contribution rate of 20%. However, the income from research grants and contracts is
due to successful applications in recent years and it is expected to drop by about £5M p.a. in the
near future because of the drop in the number and value of successful research applications. [A total
of 468 grants were awarded to the University in the period to 31 October 2009 – this represents a
year-on year decrease of 292 awards. The total value of awards also decreased from £61.3M to
£50.2M, representing a year-on-year decrease of £11.1M. The biggest drop was in the Faculty of
Medicine, Health and Life Sciences.]
Total expenditure was £282.095M, an increase of 15.1%. However staff costs rose by only 6.6% to
£155.881M and are now only 58% of expenditure (excluding depreciation). [The peer group
average in 2007-08 was 61%.]
This Financial Year 2009-10
Senate receives financial estimates for the current year at every meeting. In November the estimated
surplus for the current year was £11.732M. The estimated surplus usually increases during the year,
and in this case it had increased by about £8M from June. Part of the increase was due to a
provision for additional pay and pension costs of £4.3M being revised down to £2.1M. Another part
was a saving of £2.8M in the pay of those who left under the Early Retirement / Voluntary
Severance Scheme. At the December meeting an unexplained provision of £4M for capital
repayment was included to reduce the estimated surplus to about £8M.
Future QUB Finances
In November QUB was required by the government to submit detailed financial forecasts up till 31
July 2013. These are very revealing. Assumptions are needed in order to make forecasts and the
most interesting of these are:
 “A 3% real terms reduction per annum in block grant funding in each of the 3 years to
20012-13 accumulating to 10% over the period. Each 1% represents a reduction in income of
some £1.1M.
 Pay awards at an average rate of 1% are assumed through the period 2010-11 t0 2012-13 with
further provision made for incremental drift, the accelerated increments/discretionary payments
scheme and academic promotions.” [But see later.]
There were also assumptions about research earnings and overseas and postgraduate students, but
these were revised upwards in December.
With these new assumptions (and including the unexplained £4M p.a. capital repayments) the
University is now estimated to have a surplus of £5.9M in 2010-11, £2.8M in 2011-12 and to
break even in 2012-13.
Postgraduate taught students are supposed to grow from 1,932 in 2008-09 to a target of 2,820 in
2012-13, and postgraduate research students are supposed to grow from 1,259 to 1,430. Research
income is supposed to grow by £7.9M over the same period, and income from overseas students by
£2.9M.
Making Bricks Without Straw or Clay
All the above sounds fine until you look at the detailed financial forecasts. I can find no sign of
increased non-pay expenditure to cope with the extra students. And expenditure on the most
important resource needed for the extra teaching and research – staff – is shown to remain static in
cash terms until a slight increase in 2012-13 (presumably the buying of “stars” for REF). FTE staff
numbers are also shown and these remain static during this period. If you calculate an average
salary it will decline in cash terms and only recover to the current cash level in 2012-13. So
much for rewarding the staff for all the extra work expected from them!
Discussions should already have taken place with Schools to agree:
 “areas where further disinvestment is required;
 investment priorities that will support the institutional research strategy and the achievement of
core performance targets.”
Senior management assures us that the planning process is bottom up. There should have been
discussion in all the Schools about how the 2009 Academic and Financial Plan is to be
implemented. Were you asked about how the extra students could be recruited and taught and
what resources would be available for this? Were you asked about how the extra research
output could be achieved and what resources would be available for this? Were you asked
what parts of your School could be cut and how the workload of the departing staff could be
covered? If you were not, complain to your Head of School and tell the UCU Officers.
Early Retirement and Severance Outcomes
103 staff were made an offer of early retirement or voluntary severance (PR/VS). 72 accepted the
offer, one died and 30 declined. “Heads of School, in liaison with the appropriate Dean, will
critically review the workload of those staff who have declined the offer of early
retirement/voluntary severance, with a view to managing these staff through the University’s normal
performance management processes.” The bulk of those who accepted left at the end of October
and only three are yet to go. The packages together with two lectureships made vacant in the School
of Medicine etc. cost a total of £7.370M and will result in gross payroll savings of £4.265M p.a.
£9.93M was set aside in the 2008-09 accounts to fund the scheme and this was added to £139K left
over from earlier schemes. This means that about £2.7M is left to fund any further early retirements
or voluntary severances. No new plans have been announced, but they are rumoured.
“Further disinvestment will be necessary to ensure financial sustainability and to create the funds for
investment in selective areas…” “The reinvestment in academic posts will include both ‘capacity
building’ appointments (normally at lecturer level) and ‘strategic leadership’ posts (normally at
Professorial Range 3 or 4, as outlined in the Institutional Research Strategy). These strategic
leadership posts may involve the recruitment of research ‘teams’.” “The new posts will be brought
forward in two tranches – in January 2010 and in May 2010.”
QUB Pay Facts
You all received a message from the V-C just before Christmas telling you how well paid you are
and using some carefully chosen examples. The examples of pay increases included normal
incremental progression, and such progression is just a means of delaying paying the full rate for the
job. Moreover, most people are on the top point of their scale and so have no incremental
progression. Also the message fails to mention the increased workload and the fact that leavers are
often replaced, if at all, by someone appointed on a lower grade.
A better overall picture is to go to the accounts and look at changes in the average salary over all
staff (total pay divided by the number of staff). Compared to 2004-05 the average salary had risen
by 25.0% in 2008-09. During this period the V-C’s salary increased 42.8%. Moreover, the
financial estimates show that QUB management intend to hold the average salary static in the future
with that in 2012-13 estimated to be only £59 p.a. more than in 2008-09.
By law, the QUB accounts have to summarise staff with remuneration above £100K, excluding
employer’s pension contributions, but including NHS merit payments and the NHS share of clinical
salaries. What is included was changed recently, so we cannot go far back in time.
07/08 08/09
£100,001 - £110,000 18
5
£110,001 - £120,000
5
17
£120,001 - £130,000
7
5
£130,001 - £140,000
2
2
£140,001 - £150,000
6
4
£150,001 - £160,000
4
3
£160,001 - £170,000
5
7
£170,001 - £180,000
6
3
£180,001 - £190,000
2
5
£190,001 - £200,000
1
3
£200,001 - £210,000
2
2
£220,001 - £220,000
1
2
£220,001 - £230,000
1
£230,001 - £240,000
£240,001 - £250,000
1
The people in the table would be the V-C, Registrar, Administrative Directors, Deans, Clinical
academics, and some Heads of School. Very few ordinary professors would get into the table.
The 6.6% increase in the total pay bill should not be confused with an average pay rise for
individuals. Not only does the total include the increases paid to top people described above, but
also there has been a growth of 2.2% in total staff:
Average staff by category 1994/5 1999/00 2004/5 2005/6 2006/7 2007/8 2008/9
Academic
768
837
991 1,020 1,068 1,105 1,124
Administration
266
281
389
402
460
497
526
Technical
446
516
459
440
384
357
342
Research
306
389
549
527
521
549
574
Other 1,104
1,367 1,189 1,095 1,083 1,094 1,117
Total 2,890
3,390 3,577 3,484 3,516 3,602 3,683
Snippets
Missing Wellbeing. QUB management undertook a Workplace Wellbeing Survey in October 2008.
This followed on from a similar national survey conducted by UCU of a sample of members. In that
10.1% of respondents from QUB said that they were always or often bullied, and Queen’s was
included in a list of 19 worst higher education institutions. There were only five other pre-92
universities in the list and no others from the Russell group. With only 37.2% never bullied
Queen’s was far worse than the national average of 51%. We issued advice about bullying in our
November 2008 Newsletter. Queen’s UCU were promised sight of the QUB management’s results
in January 2009 with the final report being produced by March 2009. We are still waiting to see
the figures let alone to discuss how to improve matters. We suspect that the figures are no better
than those of the UCU survey, since otherwise QUB management would be trumpeting their results.
The lack of urgency in addressing the problem of bullying of staff is a real indication of
management’s concern for their wellbeing.
Queen’s UCU Accounts. The Queen’s UCU accounts for 2009 have been compiled. Expenditure
was lower than for 2008 and income broadly equivalent. A strong balance remains. Any member
who wishes to see the accounts can contact Patricia McKnight (ext 3090) in the UCU office.
Stranmillis Merger. Talks are progressing slowly. The merger requires Assembly approval and
will not take place until at least 2010-11.
USS. Discussions with the national employers on changes to the pension scheme are going badly.
There is a national UCU meeting on 15 February to brief representatives of Local Associations.
Promotion for Research Staff. For quite some time, Queen’s UCU has been complaining that the
career prospects for research staff are QUB were poor compared to many Russell Group and 1994
Group institutions. UCU were invited to make a submission on the issue and we highlighted that in
most institutions research staff could apply for promotion and that there were automatic reviews for
staff with one year’s service on the top of the AC1/grade 6 and AC2/grade7 scales. In addition, we
drew attention to the fact that only a small minority of these institutions tie promotion to the
availability of external funding.
Make Education Count. In conjunction with other education unions, UCU launched a campaign
at Stormont last week highlighting the differences in educational achievement and in further and
higher education on a constituency basis. The event was sponsored by Sue Ramsay, chair of the
Employment and Learning Committee.
Higher Education Strategy. The minister for Higher Education, Sir Reg Empey has appointed a
committee chaired by Sir Graeme Davies, V-C of the University of London to develop a higher
education strategy for Northern Ireland. It is proposed that a draft policy be developed by July 2010
and that public consultation would begin in September. Renee Prendergast is the Trade Union
representative on the Steering Committee. Queen’s Pro-Chancellor Rotha Johnston represents
business. The University is represented by the Vice-Chancellor.
Fixed-term and Hourly-paid Staff. We are holding a meeting of such staff to discuss their
particular problems and concerns on 4 February in Committee Room A, Admin Building
starting at 13.00. We will also discuss business for the national meeting and elect representatives
to it.
Academic-related Staff. We are holding a meeting of such staff to discuss their particular
problems and concerns on 11 February in Committee Room A, Admin Building starting at
13.00. We will also discuss business for the national meeting and elect representatives to it.