NUIG President huge expenses bill

Wompa1

So sadly the president of NUIG has become the latest high paid public servant to be exposed for crazy expenses claims. Claiming over 150,000 euro last year alone. What do people on here think?

GalwayKiefer

Any link to a report or broken down figures?

dilallio

http://www.galwaynews.ie/21130-nuig-defends-presidents-expenses-bill

NUIG DEFENDS PRESIDENT'S EXPENSES BILL

August 23, 2011 - 10:33am NUIG DEFENDS PRESIDENT'S EXPENSES BILL


NUI Galway has defended its President's expenses bill for last year.
President Jim Browne spent 150 thousand euro from his office in 2010 according to figures released under the Freedom of Information Act.
NUIG President Jim Browne's office spent over 21 thousand euro on travel and subsistence payments, of which over 12 thousand was paid directly to him for mileage or travel costs.
His office also spent 14,600 on hospitality and over 4,000 euro on gifts for visitors.
In a statement to Galway Bay FM News, college authorities said the spend was offset by "significant benefits" for the university through international partnerships and activities.

Ficheall

http://www.nuigalway.ie/fo/services/pay_scales/index.php?name=PRESIDENT

ethernet

... and this is the ______ who refused to take a pay cut and sings and dances at every opportunity at the mention of reintroducing student fees. No wonder.

*bites tongue*

KittyeeTrix

This cracks me up!!!! My student grant has been slashed by 60% for my final year of study... Its increasingly looking like I'm going to have to put part of my mortgage on hold for the best part of the year just so that I can finish yet my travel costs were not taken into consideration when the mileage for the non-adjacent grant was doubled....
Oh god, I'm so bloody angry about now:mad:

kabakuyu

This beggars belief, is there no control or ceiling on expenses in NUIG, 4000 on gifts for visitors :mad: Brownes salary appears to be 200k plus already.

Webbs

If I read it correctly its his office that has claimed the majority of that money. I am guessing here that his office would be involved in wooing both foreign students, businesses both national and international and generally raising the profile of what is after all one of the major employers and contributors to the local economy. I am guessing this doesnt come cheap and I may be wrong but a CEO of a company 'employing' (am including students here as well) approx 20,000 would I'm sure incur at least those sort of expenses.
His views on cuts whilst maintaining his salary are hypocritical of him but is a different issue to the expenses of the Presidents office.

Wompa1

Webbs wrote: »

If I read it correctly its his office that has claimed the majority of that money. I am guessing here that his office would be involved in wooing both foreign students, businesses both national and international and generally raising the profile of what is after all one of the major employers and contributors to the local economy. I am guessing this doesnt come cheap and I may be wrong but a CEO of a company 'employing' (am including students here as well) approx 20,000 would I'm sure incur at least those sort of expenses.
His views on cuts whilst maintaining his salary are hypocritical of him but is a different issue to the expenses of the Presidents office.

I have been to conferences held by the largest companies in the world. I got a pen and paper once. How can a University justify spending any money on 'gifts'? The amount spent on milage is insane..12,000 euro for one year for a University. Boggles the mind. I'd love to see a further break down of expenditure in the University on computer refreshes, flat screen tv's, couches etc.

Wompa1

The mileage at a good rate of pay assuming (0.87 per mile) would be around 22,200 km a year. I'm bad at Maths but that's what I'm putting it at. I wonder if these claims are on public record so they can be scrutinized further e.g. Where he was driving to and why...something tells me there's a lot of personal miles in there.

PopeBuckfastXVI

Webbs wrote: »

If I read it correctly its his office that has claimed the majority of that money. I am guessing here that his office would be involved in wooing both foreign students, businesses both national and international and generally raising the profile of what is after all one of the major employers and contributors to the local economy. I am guessing this doesnt come cheap and I may be wrong but a CEO of a company 'employing' (am including students here as well) approx 20,000 would I'm sure incur at least those sort of expenses.
His views on cuts whilst maintaining his salary are hypocritical of him but is a different issue to the expenses of the Presidents office.

That sort of well thought out, reasoned view has no place in this discussion, this is the internet.

ZOMG HE SPENDS DE MONIES ON DE GIFTSSSS!!!!

Wompa1

I don't know how anybody could defend 150k in expenses but sure to each their own I guess. I remember the TDs expenses were released in excel spreadsheets before, maybe these should also, I'd love to see the break down of expenses for post doc students too.

Robbo

I've just cracked open a can of Tesco Value Outrage.

I will say that it's not just the president's office; there's been expenses scandals involving "flavour-of-the-month" Departments and tales of faculty heads that live like Hedonismbot.

ethical

We definitely have a two tier system in the Irish Public Sector.The untouchables eg politicians,Uni profs,smart alec economists and........................the other end of the scale we have the frontline nurses ,firemen ,teachers,Gardai,etc that the Gov always use as the excuse that we need Europe so that we can pay the wages of nurses etc......the truth is we need the money to pay for the Back office Bollixes of fat cat polititicians et al ...and Europe is riddled with just as much of them as we are and are afraid to change the rules!

biko

Please keep this thread about NUIG only, and keep it civil.

DeepSleeper

Wompa1 wrote: »

I don't know how anybody could defend 150k in expenses but sure to each their own I guess. I remember the TDs expenses were released in excel spreadsheets before, maybe these should also, I'd love to see the break down of expenses for post doc students too.

What are post doc students?

I love Joan Burton

DeepSleeper wrote: »

What are post doc students?

I love Joan Burton

Personally Browne should be ashamed of himself and should resign

apoeiguq3094y

To be honest 150,000 in expsense isn't that much, its not like he was putting that money in his pocket, its just money he spent on behalf of the university.

Everybody is getting out the pitchforks and calling for blood, but I haven't seen any breakdown of expenses to justify any criticism. The expenses were for his office, not just for him personally. If you take for example a 2 person 4 day trip to a university in the US: flights -1500 each, hotel 150 x 4 nights, each - 50 per day for food etc each, maybe 400 for car hire for the 4 days. That would be 5000. not hard to image him making 10 trips like that on offical business... theres 50,000. Wouldn't be long before you get to 150,000.

These days in the university everything is put through expenses, so office supplies etc would all have to be taken into account. 4000 on gifts. Any knick knack that you would give someone would be ~20 squid. So thats only 200 gifts. I could easily see how a university president would end up giving out 200 gifts. The gifts are for offical business. It's not like he gave the missus a bag of cash and told her to get herself something nice...

Don't see what all the hubub is about.

Wompa1

dafunk wrote: »

I cannot think of a single reason to justify that many trips abroad. This is not the Irish president, this is the president of a university. Can you explain WHY they would have any trips abroad, given that all liaising with foreign universities would be done by the liaison officer and through the international department as opposed to the presidents office.

Also I'm pretty sure I read previously that thousands was spent on some video conferencing equipment for the University...

Webbs

dafunk wrote: »

I cannot think of a single reason to justify that many trips abroad. This is not the Irish president, this is the president of a university. Can you explain WHY they would have any trips abroad, given that all liaising with foreign universities would be done by the liaison officer and through the international department as opposed to the presidents office.

Your argument doesnt really hold up. Your argument should also say why does the Irish President or say Enda Kenny have to go abroad? I am sure they have offices that deal with that sort of thing.
International students (and that wouldnt be the only reason to go abroad) are a major income for the University so in the grand scheme of things a few trips to the US or more specifically Asia and attract more students etc by him shaking a few hands is well worth it. And yes it is important that the figurehead of a University or Company is seen at major events abroad.

Wompa I am not sure what you do but if you were involved in trying for a large contract over many years duration who do you think would be more memorable, the guy who comes to see you or the guy who will do a video conference in the middle of the night?

Wompa1

Webbs wrote: »

Your argument doesnt really hold up. Your argument should also say why does the Irish President or say Enda Kenny have to go abroad? I am sure they have offices that deal with that sort of thing.
International students (and that wouldnt be the only reason to go abroad) are a major income for the University so in the grand scheme of things a few trips to the US or more specifically Asia and attract more students etc by him shaking a few hands is well worth it. And yes it is important that the figurehead of a University or Company is seen at major events abroad.

Wompa I am not sure what you do but if you were involved in trying for a large contract over many years duration who do you think would be more memorable, the guy who comes to see you or the guy who will do a video conference in the middle of the night?

Honestly, personal impression doesn't mean jack and I say this as somebody who has worked in a job in which I've had to do video conferences, conference calls and presentations in person, it will always come down to the bottom line. Quality of service and price.

NUIG should invest in improving the quality of their lecturers and content of their subjects rather than expensive plane rides and car journeys..I still, even with what you are saying, can't understand how so much was spent.

The only real way to justify this is to present the breakdown of expenses with specific details. I also have first hand experience of a Phd student who went abroad for conferences on tax payer money and didn't attend the feckin' conferences.So maybe my view of the University has been tainted in recent years.

Either way, they need to be brought to task and made to explain these things. Systematic change is required for many of the public sectors. Universities are getting a lot of funding and they should be under the microscope. If it's justified than what harm? Show us.

Also for those wondering. Post Doc. Is Post Doctorate students..

DeepSleeper

Wompa1 wrote: »

Also for those wondering. Post Doc. Is Post Doctorate students..

Well, I was wondering... but I think you're mixing up post-graduate students and post-docs (who, by definition, are not students...).

Anyway, whether you can or you can't tell the difference, I agree with you to the extent that universities must be accountable for their expenditure, but I think it is unhelpful to suggest that all the expenses incurred by the President's office went into his own pocket - university presidents travel extensively for all sorts of legitimate reasons and also have to represent their institution well at home too - this includes meeting important visitors, exchanging gifts etc etc - otherwise, the profile of the institution would suffer and vital external (i.e. non-Governmental) income would decline. Third-level education is a competitive marketplace and you have to sell the institution nationally and internationally...

And that's from someone who funded their own PhD and their own conference trips...

Columc

Burn the university down, sure it hasn't done any good to Galway.

Each year we have to deal with the students and their shingians over RAG week, and now this scandal that the president of the university pocketing money! all on us the tax payers!

burn it down,

I have my pitchfork ready!

:rolleyes:

Wompa1

Columc wrote: »

Burn the university down, sure it hasn't done any good to Galway.

Each year we have to deal with the students and their shingians over RAG week, and now this scandal that the president of the university pocketing money! all on us the tax payers!

burn it down,

I have my pitchfork ready!

:rolleyes:

Sweet, I could loot me a flat screen tv and laptop.

Webbs

Wompa1 wrote: »

NUIG should invest in improving the quality of their lecturers and content of their subjects rather than expensive plane rides and car journeys..

Thats the key word, investment. The money from government funding has decreased each year for the past while.

So to continue to attract the best researchers, lecturers, students etc then NUIG has to continue to invest heavily and therefore has to obtain money from lots of different streams not just the public purse.

To this end the Presidents Office are the sharp end of the Universities presence nationally and worldwide and whilst you may think a video conference is enough to try and generate this money then I have to disagree.

What I do agree with you is transparency in the whole expenses process.

Wompa1

Webbs wrote: »

So to continue to attract the best researchers, lecturers, students etc

Continue? Do you believe that to be true? I know it's a matter of opinion but I don't think I'd say they are attracting the best...

DeepSleeper

Wompa1 wrote: »

Continue? Do you believe that to be true? I know it's a matter of opinion but I don't think I'd say they are attracting the best...

You might not be alone in those thoughts, but what is your opinion based on?

Have you studied (or do you study) at NUIG?

Have you worked (or do you work) at NUIG?

Have you employed (or chosen not to employ) any NUIG graduates?

Have you looked in detail at research performance, publication levels, grants awarded to researchers, patents registered etc etc.

Wompa1

DeepSleeper wrote: »

You might not be alone in those thoughts, but what is your opinion based on?

I did not attend the University, I did some work for the Uni but was never directly employed by them. I'm not aware of research performance as the only things published into the public domain seem to be the positive stories e.g. The story about the breed of bee discovered or the new safer fire extinguisher etc.

The only times I hear the negatives is when talking to friends who currently study Phd's or Masters in the University. Patents registered wouldn't exactly be a relevant statistic in my mind as there are millions of patents which end up on the drawing room floor. I also don't agree with the policy that if you patent something during your years in that university they have a claim to a percentage of the profits..but that's a whole other argument.

Publication levels, I only really know of for one department, there is not too much high level publications currently achieved by the students in that department, some by senior heads of the dept in the last few years.

But why does any of this matter? My opinion is that 150k in expenses is ridiculous and it seems to be the opinions of others. Even without the above mentioned insight, I'm a tax payer and have been for a long time. I could have bought a house with the amount of taxes I've already paid.

I think it's important for people to have opinions on public services such as Universities, Hospitals, County/City councils and question these frequently. When you don't question them they are even more likely to do back handed things, thinking they can get away with them since nobody is watching.

DeepSleeper

Don't get me wrong - I haven't a clue about levels of patent registration either, but I have, in the past, done a PhD at NUIG and have done some teaching there too. Accordingly, I (and others) are likely to be annoyed when you say the university is not attracting the best lecturers and students - you're tarring a lot of people with one large brush there.

I think NUIG has some amazing, top-rank academics on their payroll and I think they also have a lot of very, very good students. On the other hand, there are certainly people there doing PhDs and Masters degrees who are not at the cutting edge of research in their field - but should we then think less of the university (including all academics and students) because of these below-par few? Like your friend who travelled abroad on a funded trip to a conference and then didn't attend it - should we judge everyone by his/her measure?

I agree that publicy funded universities should be accountable, but we should also bear in mind that the expenses of the President's office are but a very small portion of the annual budget for the institution (which I'd guess is around 100million euro) - an institution of that size needs to spend money sending its CEO/President/top dog (call it what you will) to meetings at home and abroad - it needs to spend money on welcoming visitors and it needs to pay for these things - make them accountable by all means but don't portray all in the institution as profligate wasters...

Sponge Bob

NUIG has some strange successes over the years, eg Hydrology, where they taught half of Africa how to find water and get it to the population. How do you monetise that ???

Wompa1

DeepSleeper wrote: »

Don't get me wrong - I haven't a clue about levels of patent registration either, but I have, in the past, done a PhD at NUIG and have done some teaching there too. Accordingly, I (and others) are likely to be annoyed when you say the university is not attracting the best lecturers and students - you're tarring a lot of people with one large brush there.

I think NUIG has some amazing, top-rank academics on their payroll and I think they also have a lot of very, very good students. On the other hand, there are certainly people there doing PhDs and Masters degrees who are not at the cutting edge of research in their field - but should we then think less of the university (including all academics and students) because of these below-par few? Like your friend who travelled abroad on a funded trip to a conference and then didn't attend it - should we judge everyone by his/her measure?

I agree that publicy funded universities should be accountable, but we should also bear in mind that the expenses of the President's office are but a very small portion of the annual budget for the institution (which I'd guess is around 100million euro) - an institution of that size needs to spend money sending its CEO/President/top dog (call it what you will) to meetings at home and abroad - it needs to spend money on welcoming visitors and it needs to pay for these things - make them accountable by all means but don't portray all in the institution as profligate wasters...

I get your point and I don't think it seems like, or at least I never meant for it to seem like that there aren't some good students and lecturers there. 150k is a lot of money for expenses, the only way I can be convinced otherwise is being shown the expenses and the business reason for each, the only way that'll happen.

As for the friend who did that with the conferences, this friend has not been found out..so there is something wrong with the system. If she can exploit the system and not be found out it needs to go up the chain, if the person at the helm is also exploiting the system...well, what hope have we? The whole place would be rotten.

Wompa1

Sponge Bob wrote: »

NUIG has some strange successes over the years, eg Hydrology, where they taught half of Africa how to find water and get it to the population. How do you monetise that ???

There's no way to answer to that without sounding heartless so I won't attempt to...but there is an answer in my head

I love Joan Burton

Did browne get the sack yet or did he keep his cushy dossy job?