A university boss accepted a pay increase of £45,000 in the year of her retirement despite previously complaining about government ‘cuts’ to funding.
Dame Julia Goodfellow, vice chancellor of the University of Kent, was paid a total of £324,000 in 2016-17, up by 16.1 per cent from £279,000 in 2015-16.
The rise, revealed in the institution’s annual accounts, was made up of a £20,000 pay increase and a £25,000 performance-related bonus.
It comes after she co-signed an open letter hitting out at government cutbacks in higher education grants and arguing in favour of higher tuition fees for students.
Dame Julia Goodfellow, pictured being made a Dame CBE by the Queen in 2010, accepted a pay increase of £45,000 in her final year
Despite her concerns over institutions’ tight budgets, it appears she was nevertheless happy to take an enhanced pay package before leaving her post.
Yesterday, University and College Union general secretary Sally Hunt said: ‘The controversy over vice-chancellors’ pay has shone a real light on the poor leadership of those in charge of our universities and given the impression that they are just in it for themselves.
‘These latest revelations look like further evidence of one rule for the few at the top and another for everyone else.
‘Picking up massive pay hikes or bonuses as they retire tell the tale of people massively out of touch with reality on campus and in the wider world.
‘There needs to be far greater scrutiny of these types of deals that continue to embarrass our universities.’
Dame Julia Goodfellow, vice chancellor of the University of Kent, was paid a total of £324,000 in 2016-17, up by 16.1 per cent from £279,000 in 2015-16
Dame Julia retired in July last year after 10 years in office at Kent, which is ranked 25th in the country in the Complete University Guide.
She was president of vice chancellors’ club Universities UK for the last two years and oversaw the group’s campaign for the country to stay in the EU.
In 2010, she co-signed a letter to a newspaper which criticised ‘disproportionate cuts to higher education funding’ and argued in favour of raised tuition fees to keep budgets afloat.
News of the final-year increase is likely to revive criticism of the generous arrangements for outgoing vice-chancellors, which saw Christina Slade earn £808,000 in her final year at Bath Spa University, including a £429,000 payment for ‘loss of office’ last year.
Dame Glynis Breakwell, who is leaving as vice-chancellor of the University of Bath in August 2018, has also faced criticism for taking a semester’s sabbatical at a cost of £230,000 when she steps down.
The figures, compiled by Times Higher Education, also showed another long-serving leader – Baroness Brown of Cambridge, who as Julia King was vice-chancellor of Aston University for 10 years until October 2016 – also received a significant pay package prior to her departure.
Lady Brown – who became a dame in 2012 prior to her elevation to the House of Lords in 2015 – was paid a total of £110,863 in her final three months of office.
This included a salary of £70,000, a £31,000 bonus and £9,863 in contributions towards an ‘unregistered, unfunded retirement benefits scheme’ in lieu of pension contributions.
It meant that in total, Aston paid £398,000 towards the costs of the vice chancellor role that year.
The rise, revealed in the institution’s annual accounts, was made up of a £20,000 pay increase and a £25,000 performance-related bonus
This is because the institution also paid nearly £287,000 to Lady Brown’s successor, Alec Cameron, for his nine months in office.
The total amount is about £49,000 more than was paid in 2015-16 for the role.
New guidance on vice-chancellors’ pay was published last week by the Committee of University Chairs, including a warning that final-year salaries ‘should not be inflated to boost pension benefits’.
A Kent spokesman said that Dame Julia was paid a salary of £265,000 in 2016-17, up from £246,750 in the previous year, reflecting a rise ‘in line with the sector average’.
She also received an ‘additional payment in lieu of [an] employer pension contribution of £37,258’.
The ‘one-off, non-pensionable bonus of £25,000’ was ‘in recognition of her sustained high performance during her final year as vice-chancellor’, the university added, stating that Dame Julia’s leadership had ‘assisted the organisation and its staff to respond with optimism and vigour to the challenges the organisation confronted’.
An Aston spokesman said that Lady Brown had ‘received a payment of £31,000 for meeting predetermined targets for exceptional leadership, including the achievement of excellent student retention rates, increased student numbers and stronger than average student satisfaction despite a rapid increase in student numbers’.
They added: ‘The receipt of this payment was dependent on the meeting of these strategically important targets, and completely unrelated to her decision to retire from post.’
‘[Lady Brown] was not present at these committees for the discussion of her own remuneration.’