Originally published on February 10th, 2009

The University of Edinburgh has defended the 9.6% pay rise  awarded to the Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University, Sir Timothy O’Shea.

The increase means O’Shea’s basic salary rose from around £205,000 to £228,000 in 2008, a rate almost three times the level of inflation. 
University spokeswoman Jane McClosky told the Student that the “University is a major business and requires the best leadership to continue its outstanding success.”

She added that since O'Shea's tenure began, the University “has continued to advance consistently, including in terms of academic and research excellence, financial turnover and commercialisation of research, and overall performance against peer groups.” 

McClosky stressed that the Principal had no involvement in setting his salary.

The pay rise awarded to O’Shea was part of an average 10 per cent rise for Scottish principals, with similar increases for the principals of the universities of St Andrews and Glasgow.

O’Shea is Scotland’s second highest-paid principal after Sir Muir Russell of Glasgow University, whose salary totals £230,000, rising to £262,000 when pensions arrangements are included. The biggest increase went to Robert McCormack of the UHI Millennium Institute in Inverness, who was awarded a 25% raise.

According to Universities Scotland, Scottish institutions are now receiving the lowest settlement from the Scottish Government since devolution in 1999. 

In 2007, Scottish principles expressed their concerns at the lack of additional funding, after receiving only a fifth of a promised financial package. 

It is assumed that the current economic downturn will create more uncertainty for Scottish universities, with public spending expected to be tightened.

The increases have received widespread criticism. 

Peter Axon, a spokesman from UCU Scotland, the union which represents lecturers stated, “It beggars belief that, once again, we are seeing principals accepting huge pay increases at a time when the message to the rest of staff is that there is no spare money for salaries.”

“There is a growing feeling that universities are being run as businesses in which the collegiality on which their past successes have depended is abandoned and senior managers are paid inflated salaries to get as much as possible out of their junior employees for as little reward as possible

The President of NUS Scotland, Gurjit Singh, expressed his worry at the potential for the rise to have a ‘demotivating effect’ on the staff working with students. EUSA President Adam Ramsay refused to comment on the issue.

A spokeswoman from Universities Scotland defended the increases, telling the Student that, “when comparing the public to the private sector, in scale of the job at hand, the salary increases are really very modest.” 

She also stressed that “it was not as if academics had not had increases,” pointing towards the average 6% rise they saw in 2007.
Sir Prof. O’Shea was appointed to his current position in 2002 after a successful academic career in which he held prominent positions at the Open University and the University of London. 

He also sits on the board of Scottish Enterprise and The China-Britain Business Council, receiving his knighthood in the Queen’s 2008 New Years Honours List.