Prior to the meeting, Senators were amongst those who attended the official opening of the Sir Llew Edwards Building (pka GPN4). The Chancellor joked that it might become known as 'the Llew'. Sir Llew made a very good speech that demonstrated his passion for the University.

Prior to the meeting proper, the Faculty of Health Sciences gave a presentation on their proposed Super GP Clinic for the Ipswich campus (part of a Federal Govt initiative). It will involve establishing a company to run the clinic.

Annual Reports - OH&S and Staff Development

The 2008 OH&S annual report was included in the agenda papers and discussed. External senators were impressed with the low number of incidents and injuries given the size and complexity of the University, relative to what they see on other boards. At the V-C's suggestion, the staff of the OH&S Unit were congratulated.

The 2008 Staff Development Committee report was noted without comment.

Review of MIS

The review of the Management Information Section and a report on implementation of the recommendations was included in the papers, but not sought by anyone to be discussed. It appears to be relatively straightforward.

Enhanced Student Charge

The ESC was introduced by the Federal Government in controversial circumstances in 2004. Senate then approved that UQ charge the maximum 25% surcharge on HECS, but prescribed that the funds be used in a certain way and that Senate receive annual reports on how the money is spent.

Earlier this year I became aware that UQ management was going to quietly drop the requirement for the funds to be separate from the general grant to Faculties and Schools and for annual reports to be submitted.

Not being happy with this, I worked with particular Senate members to develop a motion reaffirming the 2004 Senate decision. I suggested the motion be put up by student representative, Sarah Collins (who did an excellent drafting job) and I was happy to second it.

The V-C claimed there was no intention to change the way the money is spent, and that the thinking behind easing fund tracking and reporting requirements was that it was becoming increasingly difficult to link the funds to specific outcomes and to ease the reporting burden on the Faculties and Schools.

Two external senators spoke in favour of the motion, saying that students continued to be owed a demonstration that the funds were being spent in ways specific to their direct needs. I added that, as someone who prepares a report on how the funds are spent, it is not particularly onerous, and a lot less onerous than a lot of other reporting Schools are asked to do. The motion was passed.

The agenda papers, coincidentally, contained a report of the 2008 spending (it was to be the last one if management had had its way). I was disappointed that the report for the Faculty of Science (my Faculty) was so much less detailed than for other Faculties, despite the Faculty being so large and having received reports from each of its six Schools.

Budget (and Admin Review)

There was a lively discussion after my elected academic colleague, Andrew Bonnell, again asked that the Finance Committee look at alleviating the financial stress on the Faculties and Schools. He hoped that some of the Australian Government capital funding windfalls to UQ might mean that funds can be deviated from the building program.

The V-C made the usual noises about how dire the funding situation is, rightly pointing out that the Federal Budget funding improvements mostly don't kick in for another 2-3 years yet. He then passed to the Exec Director Operations (EDO) Maurie McNarn to tell Senate how an admin services review is kicking off with the intention of saving money, given that admin seems to be growing like topsy (my shorthand of what he said).

I felt the spin was all getting a bit one-sided, so rose to point out the following:

• the V-C had not addressed Andrew's point about the size of the pie slice for Faculties and Schools - I mentioned that the operating budget 2009 was $10m larger than in 2008, but the amount going to Faculties and Schools had not increased: the $10m has gone into central areas somewhere, but it was difficult to tell where due to different report formats for the budget 2008 vs 2009. (What I was thinking was that all of the recent extra executive level appointments had to be paid from somewhere.) The V-C didn't respond to this.

• a number of Schools are surviving in 2009 because of a tuition fee windfall - enrolments are above predictions. (The V-C responded that it's a worry that we are increasingly reliant on international fee income.)

• a number of Schools are also carrying forward surpluses which they need to cover their 2009 or later year costs, but are not allowed to count those surpluses in their operating year budget because the university prefers to access the funds in the current year for its building program. (The V-C responded to this that the carry-forwards will be honoured, but the issue is the timeframe in which they will be honoured.)

• the growth in admin staff that the EDO alluded to has been shown in data I saw as a member of a working party in 2008 to be in the research institutes and centres (to be expected), not in the traditional core parts of the University, and that the spending on admin is actually growing slower than other spending categories. (The EDO did not respond to this.)

Re the admin review, I said that we should always be happy to review what we are doing to see if it is as efficient and cost-effective as it could be. My School is in fact one of those that will be reviewed first, which is fine with me.