Vice-chancellor Salary Information

[Name Removed] made this Freedom of Information request to De Montfort University This request has been closed to new correspondence. Contact us if you think it should be reopened.

The request was successful.

Dear De Montfort University,

Could you please provide information about VC annual salary, travel expenses (including flights and accommodation), bonuses, and the ratified minutes of the institution's remuneration committee.

Please provide the data from 1st January 2017 - 31st December 2017. As for the committee minutes, please provide them for every meeting in 2017.

Yours faithfully,

[Name Removed]

Dear De Montfort University,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of De Montfort University's handling of my FOI request 'Vice-chancellor Salary Information'. My request is several weeks overdue.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/v...

Yours faithfully,

[Name Removed]

Fraser Marshall, De Montfort University

Dear Mr Stafferton,

Thank you for your recent email and please accept my apologies for the
delayed response. This was entirely my responsibility, and I only hope
that the delay has not greatly inconvenienced you.

 

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000-INFORMATION REQUEST

 

Your request for information has been considered under the requirements of
the Freedom of Information Act and the information is below.

 

Could you please provide information about VC annual salary, travel
expenses (including flights and accommodation), bonuses, and the ratified
minutes of the institution's remuneration committee.

 

Each of these items will be address separately below.

 

 

Vice-Chancellor's annual salary & bonuses:

 

This information is published in the annual accounts  and on DMU’s
website, available from the links on the following page:
[1]http://www.dmu.ac.uk/about-dmu/universit...

This information is therefore exempt from disclosure under S21:
Information accessible to applicant by other means.

 

 

Vice-Chancellor's travel expenses (including flights and accommodation):

 

Information relating to the Vice-Chancellor's travel expenses covering the
period until July 31 2017 will be published on the DMU website in Spring
2018 in line with the university’s established procedure for disclosure.

 

This information is therefore exempt from disclosure. The exemption under
the Act that has led to this decision is an absolute one S22: Information
intended for future publication.

 

This exemption applies because the university has an established and
demonstrable commitment to transparency and should be entitled to publish
information where appropriate resources are available to undertake the
work.

 

 

The ratified minutes of the institution's remuneration committee.

 

This information is exempt from disclosure. It is considered by the
University that the public interest in withholding the information
requested outweighs the public interest in disclosing it.

The exemption applied under the Act is S43(2): Commercial Interests. This
exemption applies because: The reason the public interest is best served
by withholding the information is that the university would experience
difficulty in recruiting to senior posts if it were obliged to release in
to the public domain information that a reasonable person would consider
highly personal and sensitive, including exact salaries. It is known that
the release of Vice-Chancellors’ salaries under FOI has had the effect of
putting upward pressure on salaries and it is reasonable to conclude that
the release of the salaries of other senior staff’s salaries would have
the same effect. This would prevent the university from negotiating
salaries from a fair position, because the applicant would know what the
university was prepared to pay.

 

While there is public interest in ensuring that the university is
transparent about its finances, we do not consider that this over-rules
the ability of the university to recruit staff at the best profitable
advantage to itself.

 

This information is also exempt under S40: Personal Information. This
exemption applies because the minutes of the remuneration committee are
concerned with the performance of identified senior members of staff. The
reason the public interest is best served by withholding the information
is that the university would experience difficulty in recruiting to senior
posts if it were obliged to release in to the public domain information
that a reasonable person would consider highly personal and sensitive.

 

While there is public interest in ensuring that the university is
transparent about its finances, we do not consider that this over-rules
the right to privacy of its senior staff, particularly given the
university’s existing commitment to transparency about publishing
information about remuneration in its annual accounts on its website: This
information is published in the annual accounts  and on DMU’s website,
available from the links on the following page:
[2]http://www.dmu.ac.uk/about-dmu/universit...

 

If you have any queries please get in touch with me to discuss them.  You
might like to know that the University’s website [3]www.dmu.ac.uk contains
a section on the Freedom of Information Act that lists other publications
readily available from the University under its Publication Scheme.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

 

Fraser Marshall

Information Governance Manager

Information Technology & Media Services

 

DE MONTFORT UNIVERSITY

T: +44 (0) 116 257 7655

E: [4][email address]

W: dmu.ac.uk

 

Responsible for: Freedom of Information, Data Protection Act compliance
and Records Management

 

Most of the information we provide in response to Freedom of Information
Act 2000 request will be subject to copyright protection. In most cases
the copyright will be owned by De Montfort University. The copyright in
other information may be owned by another person or organization as
indicated in the information itself.

 

You are free to use any information supplied for your own use, including
for non-commercial research purposes. The information may also be used for
the purposes of news reporting. However, any other type of re-use, for
example, publishing the information or issuing copies to the public will
require the permission of the copyright holder.

 

For information where the copyright is owned by the De Montfort
University, details of the conditions of re-use can be found on our
website at [5]www.dmu.ac.uk.

 

For information where the copyright is owned by another person or
organization, you must apply to the copyright holder to obtain their
permission.

 

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