University Bosses Claim £1M Expenses Amid Cash Crisis Warning.

HAYSIE

Essexphil

For me, Universities are a prime example of what is going wrong.

There has been an explosion in the number of Universities. A lot depends on how you define a University-for example, there are lots of different Unis forming part of the University of London. But, depending on how you slice it, there are somewhere between 130 and 285 Universities in the UK.

Let's use Scotland as an example. 15 Universities. 4 date to before 1600. 4 started in the 1960s. And 7 since 1992. Could say similar for anywhere in GB

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_universities_in_Scotland

All of those Universities have increased in size by a considerable margin. All got massive windfalls from the £9k a year tuition fees and the massive spike in funding for postgrad research.

But there was no quality control. The fees are almost identical. Whether you are studying Medicine at Oxford, or a Joint Honours in Bank Robbery and Credit Card Fraud at the University of East London.

The extra money did not go to the State-they don't own the Unis. It didn't go to the Teaching Staff-jobs cut, pensions removed. No-the temporary windfall went to the Managers. The Administrators.

The windfall was, at least in part, temporary. And Unis are cutting courses. Cutting jobs. But the snouts and the trough seem unaffected.