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Tuesday, 10 December 2002. A Discussion was held in the Senate-House of the following Report:
Report of the Council, dated 25 November 2002, on the construction of a new Faculty building for the School of Education (p. 360).
Sir DAVID HARRISON:
Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, I would like to give the strong support of the Trustees of Homerton College to the Report of the Council on the construction of a new Faculty building for the School of Education, on land to be leased from the College. May I declare an interest as Chairman of the Board of Trustees.
The links between Homerton and the University go back in some respects to the move of the College from London to Cambridge in 1894, but what is called convergence in this Report first began to take constitutional form in 1976 when, under the inspired leadership of the then Principal, Alison Shrubsole, Homerton became an Approved Society of the University. The present Report follows from the approval by the University of the Joint Report of the Council and the General Board last academic year, and it is primarily the University's business. However, apart from welcoming the proposal for a new Faculty building for the School of Education, the Trustees of Homerton for their part would stress the considerable importance academically and financially, once this Report's recommendations have been approved, of moving the construction phase forward without undue delay.
Dr G. R. EVANS:
Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, I would like to begin by welcoming our new Vice-Chancellor, but all speech-makers are now in a difficulty. Only 67 voters approved the Council's original proposal to allow us to be cut off for irrelevance. But an amended version succeeded. I do not know whether, if you happen not to take to my opening, I shall be allowed to continue. Shall I be given the opportunity to try out one or two of my later sentences to see whether you are prepared to deem them relevant? And what picture in print is the Regent House going to get of what happened, since my pleading with you that what I have to say is relevant to the Education Building Report will never see the light of day?
Mr DEPUTY VICE-CHANCELLOR:
It is always a delight to hear you, Dr Evans.
Dr G. R. EVANS:
I am most gratified, Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor. I will take that, if I may, as permission to continue. I can only hope that this 'shut-up-Evans' move will not be used to bring in censorship.
Mr DEPUTY VICE-CHANCELLOR:
For point of information, I don't think there is a 'shut-up-Evans' move, since I have welcomed you to this rostrum, and have encouraged you to continue to speak. So I would be obliged if you might consider withdrawing that particular phrase.
Dr G. R. EVANS:
I would be delighted to do so, Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, and am more gratified than ever by your kind encouragement to continue.
So may I welcome the new Vice-Chancellor, please? And say that I hope she has been catching up on Discussions in the Reporter and will, from October, be keeping Tuesday afternoons clear in her diary so that she can preside in person.
May I approach the Education Building Report by my own choice of route? Literary devices may be risky in future. Those with visions - or vision? - may not apply to speak in the Senate-House. It said in the THES on Friday that 'it will be Richard's ability to encourage high-value US-style 'giving' that will make or break her tenure as Vice-Chancellor'. No, it will all turn on whether she can win our trust, respect, and acceptance. Professor Richard, it says, 'made it clear' at Yale that 'much though she valued liberty and freedom of speech, it was the reasoned, enlightened voice of authority to which she hearkened most naturally. The graduate students were of course entitled to their point of view, but it would be her view, and that of the university's governing elite, that would in the end decide the issue.' I hope, new Vice-Chancellor, that the journalist got that wrong. I hope you are going to have the political sense to persuade us that he did. We are not in a trusting mood, and for good reason.
Now, Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, I am coming to the Education building.
Cambridge's problems, insofar as they are financial, are much less to do with getting the money in than with the way it leaks out through our unmended administrative plumbing. The Estate Managemnt and Building Service (EMBS) is showing every sign of being out of control. Not only has it led us into our existing commitments to £500m of new building, but it would have us gallop still further down that road.
I have no view either way as to the urgency of the need for this Education building. How can I have? This Report announces that 'Consultant architects were appointed by the University to carry out a space requirement study for the Faculty of Education. The study indicated a need for 6,851sq.m. of assignable space'. This study does not seem to have been made available for inspection by members of the Regent House at this early stage. On the boards outside this building, I see only diagrams of the new Cancer Research Facility.
The Notice in response to the Discussion on the Cancer Research Facility and the present Report set down for Discussion today, may be read in the same Reporter of 27 November. I propose to set them side by side, which will mean, Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, that I shall have to keep mentioning Cancer Research in order to comment on the Education building.
Set side by side these texts illustrate graphically what happens when points are made in Discussion and 'the University's governing élite' takes no notice and 'decides' in blatant disregard of the 'point of view' of members of its own governing body. Common sense is lost sight of; our deficit increases.
It is a requirement of our constitution that the Regent House must approve building projects such as these. Lately we have been getting a chance to approve a Grace only when demolition of an old building had already begun (9 West Rd), or when considerable sums had already been spent (the more than £5m already expended on the Cancer Research facility). So what is happening in Education? The same again.
The Cancer Research Notice says, 'One of the first questions raised was why work had been done on this project before it had been approved by the Regent House.' It accepts 'that in future a Notice to announce proposed building work should be published before the first-stage contract has been signed to be followed by a Report for Discussion when full costings for the project are available.' There is no promise not to spend millions of pounds of our money before asking us, in an era when vacancies are being frozen, promotions denied, and upgradings rejected to save a few hundred thousand. I repeat. So what is happening in Education? The same again. Even if we had had a Notice as promised for the Education building, a Notice affords no opportunity for Discussion, and it may soon require fifty signatures to call a Discussion on a Topic of Concern.
In the case of the new Education building, detailed planning permission had already been sought before the publication of the Report (4). The Notice on Cancer Research explains why it is deemed 'necessary' to seek planning permission before telling the University anything: 'The process of obtaining permission from the Local Planning Authority (LPA) to build on a site has become much longer and much more complex'. This means that there must be 'wider consultation'. 'Success is unlikely if the local community and LPA are not consulted from the early stages.' So it will be quite clear to you, new Vice-Chancellor, why it was impossible to include the Regent House in that consultation for it was obviously essential 'to carry through the planning process' before there could be any Report to the University.
It is of course 'an extremely complex project' and there have to be 'commercially confidential negotiations'. According to press reports, new Vice-Chancellor, you are good at that kind of thing. We wish you well with the 'project' of wresting control from the hands of the Director of EMBS and those of his legions.
Let me chance my arm with a few lines in parenthesis. Planning consents are being sought without Notice or warning for the massive development of the North West Cambridge Site in breach of the published undertaking to inform the University before this project moved forward. A Discussion on a Topic of Concern has been called on that, several weeks ago. Clearly this afternoon was too crowded with Reports for it to have been possible to find time for it today. We Malagasy Lemurs' 'liberty and freedom of speech' is not much use to us if we have to wait months to ask our questions.
(Education Building Report) 'The estimated cost of the new [Education] building is £13.735m, including fees and VAT. The lease will be at a peppercorn rent and a premium of £2,887,500 (index-linked), to be charged to the University's Land Fund.' That Fund is in fact in deficit (£9.27m) and buying the lease from Homerton will increase that deficit.
(Cancer Research Notice) 'The current balance on the Land Fund, taking account of all agreed and proposed commitments, including the above, is a negative figure of £12.15m. It is intended to bring this back into credit over the next three years' (italics mine). It does not say how.
They are relying on 'anticipated income from donations' and also from sale of land at Addenbrooke's - connected with the Cancer Research Project - and haven't we already used that to offset the added deficit that project will create (Reporter, p.342)? There are also other 'proposed sales of non-operational land elsewhere'. 'This is intended to bring the Land Fund back into credit' (italics mine). (Education Report). And just look at the multi-layered games with numbers in the part of the Notice which deals with the proposed multi-storey car park.
All these aspirational terms and future conditionals seek to disguise the truth that we have not got the money and this is a big risk.
(Cancer Research Notice) 'The laboratory building is to be leased to CR-UK on completion. They will meet all running and maintenance costs for at least the first ten years.' But 'the details of the arrangement with CR-UK are still the subject of negotiation,' so how do they know? The Education building? Well, there are assurances. What confidence is to be placed in them?
It is proposed yet again in the present Report that the Treasurer should be permitted by Grace to accept tenders. What do we read in the Cancer Research Notice? 'In response to Dr Evans's comments about the Treasurer accepting tenders without some form of 'supervision', the Council refer to their response of 6 May 2002 (Reporter, 2001-02, p.735) to her similar remarks on Reports concerning building works at the University Farm and at West Cambridge'. Dr Evans hesitates to say it again, but Shattock and Finkelstein's CAPSA report sided with her. This practice has led us into financial disaster. Why are we still continuing with it? The recent non-placet must add a further question. I call for the publication of the full picture of our building commitments and projects for the Regent House to see, before expenditure on this Education building goes any further. Possibly Alison Richard would be glad to see it too. Prepare it for her, if not for the University's Governing body. But publish it.
And I would like to thank you, Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor for allowing me to continue my speech in such a helpful and co-operative spirit.
Professor J. R. SPENCER (read by Mrs S. BOWRING):
Mr Deputy Vice-Chancellor, in its Seventh Report, the Board of Scrutiny drew the attention of the University to the fact that its budget is in deficit, and stated its view that an important factor in bringing about this deeply unsatisfactory state of affairs was the University's recent habit of putting up buildings without proper calculation of the costs.
Against that background, it now wishes to draw the University's attention to the fact that, in the Report now before the Regent House, we are told that some £2,887,500 of the cost of this new building will be charged to the University's land fund: which unfortunately has no money in it, and is actually already some £9.27m in the red.
We are told that there is a plan to bring the land fund back into credit. 'Anticipated income from donations and sale of land at Addenbrooke's ... and from proposed sales of non-operational land at Milton Road amounts to around £13.5m over the next three years.'
Thus to put the matter simply, the University proposes to fund part of the cost of this new building by selling off various plots of land.
In principle, there is nothing wrong with selling one asset in order to pay for another. But in order to have a proper picture of what is proposed, and whether it is wise or not, we need to know what revenue, if any, the University will lose by selling these plots of land.
What are they used for at present? If used by the University, where does it propose to transfer the activity at present carried on there, and how much will the relocation cost? If not used by the University, is it currently producing any income for the University, and if so, how much? And if the land is generating income, how does the University propose to replace that income?
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Cambridge University Reporter, 15 January 2003
Copyright © 2003 The Chancellor, Masters and Scholars
of the University of Cambridge.