Cambridge Dons Retain Control of University. (March 23, 2009)

You might think that a university that is in the 801^st year of its existence, and is 4^th in the world ranking of research universities would be seen by its political masters as knowing what it was about. And that, despite the assessment of the then newly retired president of Harvard, Neil Rudenstine, who in July 2001 noted that Cambridge's Cavendish laboratory had a budget of US$16 million: "[That] wouldn't keep our history department going".

Not a bit of it, the UK government has been having a sustained punch up with both Oxford and Cambridge to get them to accept governance by a majority external to the university. In August 2007 Oxford's congregation, voted just over 60% against, and the vice-chancellor, John Hood, who was strongly in favour came very close having to resign.

Now Cambridge, with Allison Richard as v-c has manoeuvred the government to a standoff whereby, according to The Guardian, Cambridge "has agreed to provide more information to account for the public money it receives from the Higher Education Funding Council for England (Hefce) — more than £181m in the coming year — but has resisted pressure to have a majority of external members on its governing council... [the Hefce] has agreed to a three-year compromise with the university". The funding body announced: "We are able to place reliance on the University of Cambridge's accountability information. This will be strengthened by a new annual process that has been introduced to provide additional assurance on the use of public funds, given that the university does not currently have a lay majority on its council."

The council sounding distinctly disgruntled went on to say: "In the case of this university, with its council dominated by people from within the collegiate university, those members have a potential vested interest in the application of the funds, and are not demonstrably acting primarily on behalf of the public interest. This is in contrast to almost every other higher education institution in the country, and in contrast to the bulk of publicly funded bodies in all sectors."

Nevertheless we are then told that a "modest extension of its public accountability" — essentially a meeting between the chair of the university's audit committee (an external member) and a Hefce officer — will meet its needs.

Taking care not to gloat Cambridge released the following statement: "The university found the process both constructive and helpful… The introduction of an annual engagement between the chair of the university's audit committee and Hefce is a positive step forward, from which the university expects to gain benefit."

How much of the outcome is the result of Professor Richard's skill we may never know but...

However, allowing the Hefce the last word The Guarding reports:

Asked if Hefce had reached a face-saving compromise, a spokesman replied: "We recognise with both universities that governance reform will take some time. In the case of Cambridge, in recognition of the fact that the university does not feel able to move to a lay majority on its council at this time, we have agreed that we will undertake an additional annual assurance visit specifically to gain additional comfort about the use of public funds. We will operate this mechanism for three years and expect the university's governance reform to continue moving forward in that time. At the end of three years, we will review the effectiveness of the annual assurance exercise.

"On Oxford, we are waiting for the final outcome of Oxford's governance review conducted by the members of its audit and scrutiny committee before deciding if anything further needs to be done."