Letters
We’re keen to receive your letters on a wide variety of topics, from campus life to political and social issues in the wider world. Please note that all letters will be published at the editor’s discretion, and may be edited for brevity. The letters policy is available online.
Email: the.reporter@leeds.ac.uk
or post to: Reporter, room 12.72, Employee Communications, E C Stoner Building
FUTURE PLANNING
Could somebody please explain to me and many other staff, how exactly the University is expecting to achieve a top 50 world status in the next five or six years, when senior managers are having to spend time planning for up to 20% cuts in some areas?
In my opinion, and relative to comparable institutions, we are in grave danger of talking ourselves into both an academic and economic depression.
Professor Rik Brydson
Institute for Materials Research & SuperSTEM, SPEME
Editor’s note: Thank you for this very timely query. In his Leader Column in Reporter 544, the Vice-Chancellor acknowledged that the top 50 target might be optimistic but is still achievable if we keep our collective eye on the prize. In that column, and in this issue’s Leader Column (see opposite), he gives clear indications of the actions currently being taken to protect the University, its staff and its students. He also stresses that information about plans and decisions will be openly and widely communicated as they develop.
The forthcoming strategy open meetings, detailed below, also provide all staff with opportunities to discuss their concerns with members of the Vice-Chancellor’s Executive Group.
- 23 November: Students and staff
- 14 December: Effectiveness and campus development
- 18 January: Innovation, international context and research
FESTIVE FRIVOLITIES?
In view of the current economic crisis, can someone please advise what the University’s policy is in relation to the funding of Christmas accoutrements?
It may be a mere drop in a budget ocean, but it has occurred to me for many a year that a lot of money must be spent on unnecessary decorations at this time of year. A policy for the University not to fund the annual buying of Christmas trees, decorations, pretty lights and other such festive fare would be welcomed as a sensible decision both financially and environmentally by many, I’m sure.
Many offices will be able to re-cycle previous years’ decorations or obtain an artificial tree, perhaps even make decorative paper-chains out of previous copies of the Reporter, etc, if they’re short of a bob or two.
Something to put to a referendum?
Helen Light
Research Administrator
Leeds Institute of Health Sciences
Reply: Thank you for your letter. In point of fact, very little University money is traditionally spent on Christmas decorations and the like – on average, rather less than 40 pence per member of staff last year, for example. I am sure that, in the current financial circumstances, heads of schools and services will need little encouragement to avoid unnecessary expenditure, even without a blanket ban imposed at institutional level.
Roger Gair
University Secretary
