Average vice-chancellor pay rises to £325,000 despite sector crisis

UK university leaders’ average pay package increased by 5 per cent last year, according to new analysis.

According to the accounts of 115 institutions that have been published to date and were examined by Times Higher Education, the average vice-chancellor’s total remuneration stood at £325,000 in 2022-23, a 5 per cent rise across the sample compared with a year before.

A vice-chancellor’s total remuneration typically includes benefits such as housing and pensions, along with a median salary of £272,000 in 2022-23 – up by 6 per cent year-on-year.

This puts the average rise among leaders broadly in line with the rise of between 5 per cent and 8 per cent handed to rank-and-file staff. But it comes amid growing financial strife across the sector, with some providers set to cut millions of pounds from their budgets and others announcing voluntary redundancy schemes.

The 115 universities spent a total of £38.7 million on remunerating their vice-chancellors during 2022-23.

Jo Grady, general secretary of the University and College Union, said the public would “rightly be appalled when they see the exorbitant salaries vice-chancellors are receiving”.

While institutions employing more than one vice-chancellor during the year typically had the largest outlays, one of the highest individual salaries again went to François Ortalo-Magné, dean of London Business School, who was paid £498,000.

Other pay packets were inflated by additional payments for departing vice-chancellors, including the £97,000 award in lieu of notice handed to David Richardson when he left the crisis-hit University of East Anglia last February.

Peter Neil retired as vice-chancellor of Bishop Grosseteste University in July and was one of the longest-serving leaders in the sector, but the institution’s accounts reveal that he received compensation for loss of office, including pay in lieu of notice, of £139,433.

When Charles Hunt left the University College of Osteopathy his compensation for loss of office reached £75,000.

Other pay packages were boosted by performance-related bonuses. John Latham has received a bonus in every year of his tenure at Coventry University since 2014, including almost £200,000 over the last three years and £80,768 in 2022-23. That comes despite the institution warning that it must make nearly £100 million in cuts over the next two years.

Across the Russell Group, median total remuneration stood at £398,000, compared with £309,500 among post-92s.

Lucy Haire, director of partnerships at the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi), who recently authored a paper calling for an end to the “witch-hunt” on vice-chancellor pay, said chief executives in the private sector overseeing comparable turnovers got paid much more.

“Being a vice-chancellor is a very tough job. They are running academic institutions but also big-budget businesses, which requires a very wide range of skills and a lot of experience,” she said.

patrick.jack@timeshighereducation.com