VC financial update following Council

This email was sent to all staff on Monday 27 March 2023 by Professor Robert Van de Noort, Vice-Chancellor

Dear colleagues

Following my email on 13 March, outlining how the University is managing ongoing external financial pressures, I am writing, as promised, to update you following the Council meeting that took place later that day.

At that meeting, our governing Council endorsed the approach put forward by UEB to maintain our long-term financial sustainability.

As I explained in my last email, this approach is not aimed at making drastic decisions to achieve short-term savings, rather it is to put us on stable footing to deal with increased costs, resulting from rises in inflation and interest rates, for years to come.

The following next steps were agreed:

• The University should deliver its 2022/23 budget as close to plan as is possible and seek to reduce costs by up to £5m before the end of July.
• Council has allowed the University to run a deficit of £30.7m in 2023/24 to avoid immediate cost-saving decisions that would compromise growth, reputation and sustainability. In return the University has committed to return to a surplus budget by 2026/27.
• A detailed plan for achieving significant financial improvements in the next three years will be submitted to Council at its meeting in July.
• UEB leads have been assigned areas of responsibility relating to these improvements and will develop plans over the next few months for submission to Council.

The minutes of the meeting are available on our website.

We are fortunate as a University to have reserves that provide us with a degree of financial stability. However, we must make further savings in the current year and identify the solutions that allow us to handle the increased costs, brought about by high inflation, in future years.

I will be providing some further explanation of our financial response at the all-staff session this Wednesday (29 March) at 11:30. I hope you can make it.

Kind regards

Robert Van de Noort, Vice-Chancellor