Further Consultation by the Task Force on Academic Employment on proposals for career progression for academics: Topic for Discussion

The Task Force on Academic Employment has published on its Web site a note in response to some of the points raised below: www.admin.ox.ac.uk/ps/staff/academic/tfnews/.

Contributions to the discussion were made by the following:

• Vice-Chancellor
• Introduction: Dame Fiona Caldicott (Principal of Somerville College)
• Mr R. Briggs (All Souls College, Faculty of History)
• Dr F.M. Heal (Jesus College, Faculty of History)
• Professor E.V.K. Fitzgerald (St Antony's College, Department of International Development)
• Dr G. Jones (Wolfson College, Computing Laboratory)
• The Revd Dr C.P. Thompson (St Catherine's College, Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages)
• Professor B.W. Silverman (Master of St Peter's College)
• Professor T.P. Softley (Merton College, Department of Chemistry)
• Mr N.C. Bamforth (Queen's College, Faculty of Law)
• Dr I. Voiculescu (Computing Laboratory)
• Professor S. Cooper (St Catherine's College, Department of Physics)
• Dr B.T.H. Huffman (Lady Margaret Hall, Department of Physics)
• Mr G.P. Williams (St Peter's College, Department of Politics and International Relations)
• Dr C.A.R. Boyd (Brasenose College, Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics)
• Professor W.J. Blair (Queen's College, Faculty of History)
• Mr A. Murray (University College)
• Professor G. Rodriguez-Pereyra (Oriel College, Faculty of Philosophy)
• Dame Fiona Caldicott (Principal of Somerville College)

Verbatim Report

Vice-Chancellor

I should first remind the House that under the procedure entitled 'Topics for Discussion', no vote will be taken, but the relevant regulation provides that it is the duty of Council to give consideration to the remarks made in such a discussion.

The procedure for today's discussion will be as follows.

I shall ask Dame Fiona Caldicott, as Chairman of the Task Force on Academic Employment, to introduce the discussion and set it in the general context of the work of the task force. The matter will then be open to the House. At the end of the discussion, I shall ask Dame Fiona to make any final points. I intend to close this afternoon's discussions by 4.30 p.m.

We have already asked those who have notified us of their intention to speak from the floor to restrict their remarks to a maximum length of about five minutes. Actually, a maximum length of five minutes. I would ask all speakers to come forward and to speak into the microphone, first giving their name and college or department. May I draw the attention of speakers to the device positioned to the side of the lectern. This will not be entirely unfamiliar to many. It is an anti-loquistor device, and as such has green, amber and red lights, designed to help our speakers with the timing of their speeches. The amber light shows with one minute remaining, and should encourage speakers to begin to wind up their remarks. Red means speakers are out of time and must conclude their remarks. I shall have to ask speakers to bring their remarks to an end if these extend beyond five minutes. If time permits, those wishing to speak who have not given advance notice will be invited to make their contributions and should indicate their wish to speak by rising from their seats.

I should also be grateful if any speaker who uses a written text would afterwards lend that text to Ms Cowburn, the officer who is collecting such speeches, as this will be of assistance in preparing a published record of the discussion, which will appear as a Gazette supplement as soon as possible. I hope that the issue will be published on 27 November, and it will also be published on the task force's Web site, prior to that.

May I now ask Dame Fiona Caldicott to introduce the discussion.

Dame Fiona Caldicott (Principal of Somerville College)

Thank you, Vice-Chancellor. On behalf of the Task Force on Academic Employment I'd like to welcome you all to this afternoon's discussion of our proposals. The task force has worked to date on the basis of wide consultation with individuals and bodies across the University. Today's discussion gives us a further opportunity to continue that approach and to consider points put by members of the University this afternoon. Our proposals are currently the subject of consultation across the collegiate University and are about a new promotions system for university lecturers and readers.

I should like to begin today's proceedings by setting out briefly the current position on academic promotions and the background to, and an outline of, the task force's current proposals for change. The current position regarding academic promotions at Oxford, for our largest grade of university lecturers, is effectively that there are none. Does this fit us well for our role as a leading teaching and research university in the twenty-first century? Those colleagues who are appointed to lecturerships may only acquire a post of reader or professor if one happens to be advertised in their discipline and they apply successfully for it in open international competition. While regular exercises have been held in which colleagues may apply for the title of reader or professor, successful application leads to no change in either salary or duties.

Dissatisfaction with this position, consisting of arrangements agreed by Congregation over a number of years, formed part of the background against which the task force was set up in 2005 to consider a wide range of matters concerning academic employment. Part of our extensive consultation, designed to enable us to work with the grain of academic opinion and to develop a consensual approach, was our publishing a direction of travel last year. Consultation on that document showed very broad support for the task force's emerging propositions. It also revealed a clear view that it was no longer appropriate for there to be, in effect, a single career grade for the great majority of academics at Oxford. A system of promotion and variability of workload were the two issues on which the largest majorities who responded wished to see proposals for change. Since then the task force has focused primarily on developing a new framework within which academics at Oxford can in future aspire to progress.

Our current proposals envisage regular exercises in which lecturers and readers can apply for substantive promotion to a higher grade. Those who apply successfully would receive a relatively modest increase in salary, as far as available funding can be estimated. They would also join existing substantive readers and professors in being eligible for consideration in further competitive exercises for much more substantial monetary distinction awards.

Improvement in the University's financial position would enable more promotions to be offered than the illustrative models in our paper, if PRAC and Council agree to that use of resources. General exercises to confer the title of reader or professor would in future be limited to those who would not be eligible to apply for substantive promotion under these new arrangements, although those titles and special salary arrangements would continue to be available to lecturers in acute recruitment and retention cases.

There are other very important elements in what the task force is proposing. They outline criteria for promotion and also the procedures that would be followed. We are proposing that, as well as self-application, it should be possible, in order to foster equitable outcomes and avoid gender or other imbalances, for individuals to be nominated for consideration.

The task force is very clear that promotions decisions must be made entirely on the basis of merit and not, for example, on the basis of departmental or divisional ability to pay. We are less clear on the vexed question of nomenclature, and the three levels that I have been calling 'lecturer', 'reader', and 'professor'. We can see possible merit in perhaps having 'lecturer', 'associate professor', and 'professor'.

We are acutely conscious of the range of other issues that have been referred to us, and indeed of the whole question of affordability, which was not in our terms of reference. I'd like to mention three. The need to ensure that the scope for further investment in improving academic terms and conditions should be recognised as one of a small number of key priorities in the University's resource allocation process; secondly, the need to propose a system under which the balance of a lecturer's duties can be varied over a career; and third, the need to develop a framework for academic employment for those who have not yet reached the grade of university lecturer.

My role today is not to talk about those other issues, and neither is it to make a detailed case in favour of our proposals on promotions, but I would like to listen to a broad range of developing opinion within the University on this question, and look forward to a series of contributions from colleagues about our proposals for a promotions scheme in what all of us are clear will be an open, constructive, and non-confrontational discussion.

I do urge all those present—and all those reading today's proceedings on-line or in the Gazette—to consider speakers' contributions carefully, and above all I urge everyone to read the full consultative document from the task force and to submit responses to it by the deadline of 19 January. Only in this way can the task force continue its work with the grain of academic opinion, and develop a structure for career progression which commands support among academic colleagues. Thank you.

VICE-CHANCELLOR: The discussion is now open to the House, and I should like to call upon Mr Briggs to speak first.

Mr R. Briggs (All Souls College, Faculty of History)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, members of Congregation, I very much hope that today will set a precedent by showing that a discussion meeting of this kind can play a valuable role in developing consensual solutions to some of the really difficult problems that the University currently faces. I'd also like to thank Dame Fiona for her excellent introduction and for her friendly and helpful response to the initiative leading to today's meeting.

I am convinced that the University does need a more formal and transparent scheme for promotions and am happy to support the overall framework proposed by the task force. Today, however, I shall focus on just two significant respects in which I believe that the scheme could be greatly improved, without any damage to its integrity.

The first of these concerns the relationship between the financial rewards to be given and current inequities in our pay structures. These inequities very largely arise from that well-known Oxford problem, the interface between colleges and the University. Let me say that I'm not wishing to cast any kind of indirect blame on the colleges here. Without their financial contribution, Oxford would have far less capacity to attract large numbers of outstanding academics, while the tutorial system—that jewel in our crown—would be unsustainable. Nevertheless we all know that if we disregard the Medical School for the moment, Oxford academics who are not professors fall into three broad groups in crude financial terms.

Firstly, there are the underprivileged—the ULNTFs—who receive no housing allowances or significant additional stipends. Then, there is a large group of college tutorial fellows, paid at a higher basic level and in receipt of housing allowances around the median. This package probably comes very close to the stipend of a statutory professor, who does not receive any merit award. Finally, a minority of colleges pay much higher housing allowances, taking their tutorial fellows well up the professorial merit scale. Again, I don't want to sound censorious about any of this. There are good arguments for a differential to reflect the greater responsibilities of tutorial fellows, for example—though surely not quite on the current scale—while we should not rush to condemn colleges for deciding that academics are underpaid and that they have a duty to remedy this as far as they can.

Members of all these groups will be eligible for promotion under the new scheme. What I see as crucial is that the financial rewards should take account of existing positions, so that the promotion arrangements work to counterbalance the existing differentials. We should not pay a flat sum to all ad hominem professors, because that would have perverse consequences. For example, a typical tutorial fellow who became a professor would then be better remunerated than a statutory professor, even before they came into competition for merit awards. So what we need is a scheme that would allow promoted ULNTFs to be brought up towards the basic level for statutory professors, perhaps in more than one step, then ensures that any subsequent merit awards bring all professors out at the same level in relation to their total package of taxable earnings.

Such an arrangement has the huge advantage that it offers those at the lower end of our current pay scales a realistic prospect of breaking through existing barriers on some straightforward grounds of merit. Although it cannot remove all inequities, I believe that it would be a major step towards greater fairness and towards ameliorating the deep sense of injustice that many of our colleagues must reasonably feel.

My other point can be made very briefly, because I think that other speakers will want to address it in more detail and perhaps offer alternative solutions. After talking to some past and present heads of department, it seems clear that most of them have found handling the present scheme for special rewards a peculiarly unwelcome task and would be deeply grateful to have this responsibility taken away from them. Whatever mechanisms are established for the crucial early stages of the promotions scheme, let's protect heads of department, who have plenty of other duties already, and are liable to be blamed whatever they do. Of course they should be expected to comment on all applications, and it may well be reasonable to charge them with inducing worthy non-applicants to change their minds. However, I believe it is essential that, at the least, there should be separate departmental and faculty committees, which could be as small as three senior persons, to make those initial assessments.

It should be evident, sir, that these brief comments are intended as constructive criticism, even though they would involve substantial modifications to some details of the proposals made by the task force.

Dr F.M. Heal (Jesus College, Faculty of History)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, members of Congregation, I came to serve on the task force with a strong personal commitment to the idea of the 'Republic of Letters'. My own experience in this University has been of the beneficent effects of collegiality in a university that doesn't have a particularly progressive career structure. And I also come from a faculty, History, which has in general appreciated the republican model, and has been one of the least enthusiastic about embracing the curious Oxford compromise of titles of distinction. But I agreed to serve in part because I recognised that attitudes were changing, particularly among younger academics. In both faculty and college, I regularly encountered an appetite for change, and frustration with the status quo. Experience on the task force, and in particular the responses to our questionnaire to the collegiate University, has led me to believe that we need to move systematically towards the goal of a proper promotions system—one that rewards merit, acknowledges distinction, encourages valuable staff to remain within the University, and, dare I say it, looks more recognisable in the wider academic world.

I now have no doubt that the long-term direction of the task force that it is proposing is the appropriate one. We need a system that offers a fair and clear path to promotion, a reasonable expectation that achievement will be rewarded over an academic career, and financial incentives. Ten years hence, on the very hypothetical model that we've offered, we would anticipate approximately a quarter of senior academic staff as professors, and a further quarter as readers. This may not, of course, be the final resting place, but it would provide a sufficiently balanced category division to assure promotion to a majority of lecturers entering the system. The initial promotions, as we've made clear, would have to be involving only a modest salary increase; in our cash-limited environment, it could scarcely be otherwise. It is extremely important, I believe, to ensure that a large number of people can be promoted in each round. However, it must be emphasised, as it already has been in Dame Fiona's presentation, that these would act as a gateway to later, competitive exercises for monetary distinction awards—those for which existing readers and professors are already eligible.

Much of the debate today is going to be, I suspect, about the problems of how we might move from one system to another, and I'll leave others to speak on that in specifics. However, I would wish to pick up one aspect of the response that I have had to the task force proposals, as they have been debated in college, faculty, and division—it seems a great many debates already. A number of those who are willing to support the idea of a promotions package involving change of status and income have stressed that some change of duties over career is an even more important concern. Our original questionnaire elicited similar responses. If the statistics here are of any particular use, forty-eight of our respondents—including, of course, groups, faculties, divisions and so on—prioritised promotions; forty-seven, variations of duty. Our approach to the latter issue has been to look for ways in which flexibility of duties can be built into career paths, without necessarily establishing a highway from teaching to research, which does seem, to be honest, to be the desire of some of our res- pondents. We have the duty to maintain the teaching strength of the collegiate University, as well as ensuring its research distinction. Therefore the task force is developing proposals under which all tendered staff will have the opportunity, probably on a quinquennial basis, to discuss ways of rebalancing their duties in the medium or long term. These discussions, it need hardly be said, will not be easy, since a system of joint appointments means that they must involve college, University and individual. But they seem to me, at least, to be the essential concomitant to the work already done by the task force.

The objectives of the task force have been to find forms of career development and reward for a majority of our outstanding body of lecturers. Today's proposals, I hope, are a significant step in that direction, and I hope that we will ultimately be able to take them forward.

Professor E.V.K. Fitzgerald (St Antony's College, Department of International Development)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, Proctors, and fellow members of Congregation, I speak this afternoon as an individual, not as head of my department, though my views reflect those of many colleagues. First, I think Congregation should congratulate the Task Force on Academic Employment for tackling a difficult issue head on and generating much useful information in the process.

However, the report reveals that the task force has not fully thought through the implications of its central proposal to create yet a third senior promotions system in addition to the original statutory posts and the more recent recognition of distinction exercises.

We are given to understand in the report that there is a tight budgetary constraint which prevents the overdue and logical regularisation of the pay scales for professors and readers by distinction, yet the figure of £6 million recurrent wage cost after twelve years seems arbitrarily small. The report does not compare this with any other option, such as the simple step of splicing the pay scale for this group on to that for their statutory counterparts. If academic promotion really is a priority for this University, then it should be reflected in the resources allocated to it.

Further, the task force sees the present situation of titular professors and readers as, and I quote here, 'a transitional issue and a temporary difficulty'. Yet these colleagues represent a third of all the senior academics presently at Oxford, 492 people out of a total of 1,332.

I don't see that as a temporary or marginal issue. What is more, by proposing to make the distinction title available only to non-academic staff in the future, the task force inevitably devalues the titles of distinction previously awarded for outstanding research to these 500 people.

Above all, the report and the proposals seriously undervalue the contribution of these non-statutory professors and readers who, for the last fourteen years, have stoically borne the sacrifice, in administrative terms, of the title, without any extra pay and without relief of teaching duties. Why do they do that? Because we were asked to do so in support of the University's financial difficulties. The report, in effect, compounds this unfairness by proposing that these distinguished individuals would now have to reapply for the same title to get a long-overdue pay increment. Logically, either these implications will be automatically conceded in all cases or the University will have to overturn most previous evaluations of academic merit. Either outcome fatally undermines the laudable aim of the task force to produce an effective and equitable promotions system.

I would therefore like to propose an alternative approach. This, I believe, would have the advantages of both rewarding all substantive lecturers on an equal basis, and promoting excellence in research, but without the egregious unfairness of the present proposal. Nor should it prove unduly expensive.

In brief, this approach would build on the existing dual system, substantive and titular, in two ways. Firstly, to extend the top of the university lecturer scale up to meet the bottom of the professorial scale—this increment to be awarded after external research review, just as the distinction exercises did. It would thus not be automatic. Second, to create a series of competitive Clarendon chairs. These would release ULs with recognised distinction from teaching for five years to do fundamental research. It could be adjusted to the availability of finance, just as the Fell Fund is at present.

This proposal would be much fairer to ULs, as it would offer equal opportunity to those with and without title of distinction to receive a pay rise based on merit. It would also remove the worst non-financial aspect of titular professorships—the lack of relief from teaching duties while being morally obliged to take on administrative responsibilities—while providing a direct contribution to the University's future performance in the new Research Excellence Framework.

Finally, I would like to thank once again the members of the task force for their report. As they now move on to the even more intractable issue of career paths for contract research staff, I wish them well.

Dr G. Jones (Wolfson College, Computing Laboratory)

Vice-Chancellor, colleagues, I want to pick up something that Dame Fiona said about dissatisfaction with present arrangements but, with your indulgence, I intend to address something on which the task force didn't invite us to comment in the present consultation, because it's a matter which they consider should only be one of their next priorities.

I want to speak, as Mr Briggs did, about the position of a ULNTF. I should explain, I am a university lecturer with a non-tutorial fellowship, but I'm not a ULNTF. I am not speaking about my own position. When I moved to this job, almost twenty years ago, I saw that I would be asked to take a substantial cut in salary. I was moving here from the University of Oxford, from a research post, so I was aware of this and I haggled. My labour is still cheaper to those paying for it than that of my colleagues would be, yet I'm at least as well off as if I were a ULNTF.

Those here troubled by long memories of the discussions will recall that the mountain laboured for years over the unequal conditions of employment of those with non-tutorial fellowships and what it brought forth was not one mouse but two—the old ULNTF and the new ULNTF. What have these schemes achieved? Well, let me speak of two colleges, college A and college B. I don't claim that they're necessarily extreme examples—it's not easy to tell which the extreme examples are. I choose them because I know of them. A ULNTF at college A, and a university lecturer at college B, apparently have equivalent obligations to the entity which we now seem to call the collegiate University. It sounds warm and friendly, doesn't it? That's a collegial university that's warm and friendly. The collegiate University obliges them to do equivalent duties but their pay differs by several times the size of increment which the task force proposes to attach to the promotion of a lecturer to professor.

I am sure we need to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to some distinguished academic colleagues. That part of the scheme I'm not discussing. I'm more concerned that we're intending to pay £2,500 a year, yes, to lecturers promoted on merit. It may well be that we consider the proposed increment—a spine point and a half for a reader, about three spine points for a professor—a negligible sum. If so, why are we discussing paying it? Why is the money not being put to better use? I mean, it would buy at least one really distinguished academic every two years or so. If not, then surely it's indefensible that we should be thinking of paying £2,500 to the ULNTF at college A in cash-limited recognition of his merit, when college B is already paying his colleagues many times that much in recognition of their luck in the Byzantine lottery that attaches college posts to university posts. Thank you.

The Revd Dr C.P. Thompson (St Catherine's College, Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages)

Vice-Chancellor, members of Congregation, like many of my colleagues, I imagine, I find myself torn between a Platonic world, in which collegiality and parity of esteem are prized so highly among us that no colleague feels obliged to think themselves better or more deserving than others, and this fallen world, in which we must address the problem so many colleagues face on reaching the top of the salary scale with twenty years' service before them and no possibility of further career development here. I am therefore grateful to the task force for having grasped the nettle and brought to us a set of proposals with which I am in broad sympathy.

I welcome the fact that the task force has placed undergraduate teaching alongside research in consideration of promotion, and I hope it will not be deflected from this. Such teaching represents a huge and vital investment in the future not only of this country but of the global community, and its transformational potential is incalculable. I become bothered when I sense that tutorial teaching is being considered the poor relation, or something we can keep redefining until it is no longer recognisable as itself. It is our life-blood. It is, of course, difficult to assess individuals' record in any way which stands up to robust scrutiny, but at the very least the colleges must, and can, play an integral part in any such process.

I agree that the Recognition of Distinction exercise should be discontinued, except for those who are not eligible under the proposed scheme. Like others, though, I believe that all holders of joint appointments, once their probation period is completed, should hold, if they wish, the title 'professor'. I would think differently if we had not gone so far down this particular road, because in my Platonic world, I believe that professors hold chairs. But in my fallen one, we cannot undo what we have done, which is, that by recognising distinction by title only, we have introduced distinctions which are profoundly uncollegial. In consequence, I believe that parity of title for permanent post-holders would go some way towards restoring parity of esteem. Are we really saying that when this University and its colleges jointly appoint colleagues to retiring age we are not always appointing the very best? We could then separate questions of title from what I believe to be the more pressing issues, of career structure and development.

There's one area, though, which I would like the task force to think about, and it concerns the proposed three-year cycle. On the figures we have, 80 per cent of the eligible staff are lecturers, 4 and 16 respectively readers and professors. It seems to me unfair and actually unhelpful, in terms of what we want to achieve, that the 80 per cent have only the same sort of chance as the remaining 20 per cent of a form of promotion, the more so since the 20 per cent of substantive readers and professors is already in receipt of additional salary, in a few cases considerable amounts, which will no doubt have given some colleagues pause for thought. Our most pressing need is surely for a scheme which enables the 80 per cent to progress in their career, especially when they have reached the plateau. Consequently, perhaps the promotions exercise currently proposed for years one, four and seven, and so on, should, at least for some years to come, take place in, say, two of the three years of the cycle, and that substantive readers and professors be considered for awards in the third, alongside the Recognition of Distinction exercise for non-eligible colleagues.

Finally, I support those who have spoken of the need for as scrupulously fair a process as can be designed, which means it should be as independent as possible. We must be above suspicion of dispensing rewards on the basis that someone is a good ally or can be trusted to toe the party line. There is already too much of that kind of patronage in public life. It has no place in a university devoted to the free, unfettered and responsible pursuit of the truth.

Professor B.W. Silverman (Master of St Peter's College)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, I want to speak on the matter of the title of reader. My proposal is incorporated as a possibility in paragraph 20 of the task force document, but it is applicable whether or not the University moves to implement the current task force proposals. The only case, as an aside, in which it would not be applicable, is if we did the thoroughly laudable thing that Dr Thompson said, of giving everyone the title of professor, which actually I would also support—but that's a more radical suggestion than in my current speech. My views are informed by experience of promotions procedures at a number of universities, in various capacities—as a candidate for promotion, as a reader, as a professor, as a head of department, as a member of promotions committees, as an external adviser looking at a 'gathered field', as a referee, and also someone who, in two successive RAEs and many other capacities, has been able to get a feel for standards at other universities.

My proposal is simple. We should have only one title of distinction and only one title of promotion: professor. Six points:

First, the title of reader is incomprehensible outside the UK and indeed inside too. I was at a conference last week and I asked a group of senior colleagues from all over the world about this. They certainly confirmed my view. If one of our aims is to give recognition of distinction in any form, we need to use vocabulary which the world understands. It's hard enough explaining, in the USA, or continental Europe, that a lecturer is actually a career-grade tenured position, but nobody, nobody knows what a reader is.

Second, the necessary standard for promotion to professor at most other UK universities is lower than our standard for attaining a readership, and in many cases, including in some strong research institutions, it's considerably lower.

Third, the comparison with the US; once you have tenure at a US university, your path to a full professorship is more or less assured, and that's not true, even for a readership, at Oxford. At most leading universities, including Stanford, the one I know best, the standard for full professor is no higher, and possibly lower, than that for a readership at Oxford.

Fourth, we do have some substantive readers at Oxford. I haven't done my homework but I think you'll find that all or nearly all of them hold the title of professor. What's that telling us?

Fifth, to incorporate my proposal into the task force proposals, if you want to, we'd simply have to have a professorship—I'll call it level zero—with a salary equivalent to that of reader in the proposals. It would be confidential whether someone was on level zero or one of the higher levels. In all other ways, promotions from level zero to the higher range would be exactly as envisaged by the task force. I do not support the use of the title 'associate professor'. I very strongly do not support that, because that simply means a lecturer who has been given a permanent appointment and we should not go near that title, in my opinion.

Finally, the only other transitional matter is to give every current reader, titular or substantive, the title of professor. They certainly deserve it.

Professor T.P. Softley (Merton College, Department of Chemistry)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, members of Congregation, I speak as a member of the task force, on which I try to represent the mid-career science academics holding the post of university lecturer or tutorial fellow. I'd like to return to the question of whether we need a promotions system at all, and speak in favour of it.

There are many reasons why we should not go ahead with the task force's proposals. At a recent college meeting I listed eight of them. There are clearly some difficulties, not least the question of mixing of a new scheme with the current titles of distinction, and there's the risk that some people will get upset and disgruntled if their applications for promotion are unsuccessful. After all, it's human nature to dislike rejection and to be suspicious of patronage and favouritism.

But, at the core of the proposals before us, the task force wants to offer all academic staff in this University a career structure, and this is what we must not lose sight of in the current consultation. I am sure there is no perfect system—no perfect way of enabling the transition between the present system and another. And we could all easily spend the next three years debating the merits of one system or another and then shrug our shoulders and give up. I hope we won't do this, although the task force is very willing to listen to possible modifications, I should stress, and we're certainly willing to adopt such changes if a strong consensus emerges. There are risks in going forward with any scheme, but these are risks that almost every other university in the world has faced up to, and we need to weigh these against the likely long-term gains. We need to be able to attract world-class academic staff and have a fair and transparent system of promotion that will give young academics something to aspire to. We need a system that will stop mid-career academics from regularly scanning the pages of the THES to look for chairs on offer somewhere else, at a time when they could be most productive in their research.

A new lecturer at Oxford can look forward to an average of around thirty-five years of employment at the same career grade. Not only is Oxford probably unique as a university in having no career structure for academics—even Cambridge, an institution whose arrangements are constantly admired by writers in the Oxford Magazine, has a system of regular promotions to readerships and professors. Fifty-two per cent of them currently hold substantive readerships or professorships. But, even in comparison with other professions, we hold a unique position in our flat career structure and, within Oxford, every other group of staff can apply for merit awards and regrading. Only the academics are left out from such exercises.

So at the moment a new lecturer can see a prospect of exciting opportunities to thrive in an academically rich community. Maybe they'll see a glittering research prize somewhere on the horizon, the prospect of external recognition in the form of an FRS or an FBA, and maybe, just perhaps in twenty or thirty years' time, the one statutory chair in their field in the University will come up for grabs and they will be able to compete for it with some of their colleagues, as well as with an internationally leading field, for this single position. And they'll also have to compete with our sometimes quirky professorial electoral board system, and if they don't get the position they'll have to threaten to leave and maybe they can apply for another job, so then they can be considered for one of our Oxford salary awards, which are reserved for well-argued cases of recruitment and retention. Such awards are currently held by over 100 lecturers and, although this process was approved by Congregation in 2001, and is reported annually to Congregation, I know that many members of Congregation do view this as a far from transparent process. Is this an adequate career structure in the modern world? I think not. And in the 2007 consultation exercise, over 60 per cent of individuals expressing an opinion about proposals for career structure agreed that there should be a realistic chance for progression between the grades of lecturer and professor in an academic career. In a task force model calculation you will note that this realistic chance is calculated as 56 per cent over a thirty-year career.

It is probably true that we are all excellent, all committed, all contributing to the reputation of the University one way or another and we all deserve a pay rise. But I think that if we really believe that we are all equally excellent, then perhaps we are failing to recognise those exceptional colleagues whose remarkable commitment, inventiveness and imagination to teaching and research make them academic leaders. We don't need equality of salary. We certainly don't have it at the moment. We need rather an equality of opportunity, and transparency, and I think that a part of collegiality sometimes means being humble enough to recognise that our colleagues have deserved a promotion in a way that we can only aspire to.

Mr N.C. Bamforth (Queen's College, Faculty of Law)

Vice-Chancellor, members of Congregation. Oxford has an ocean of talented faculty members deserving of recognition and, for this reason, I broadly welcome the recommendation that we reintroduce a genuine promotions scheme. However, the proposal has loose ends—inevitably so, given that the task force has been struggling heroically with a problem of almost unbelievable complexity. I'd like to address a couple of those loose ends today.

Congregation last had a full debate about academic career structures in March 1995, focusing on whether to introduce the titles of distinction and to remove the old personal promotions scheme. If you read back through the papers, still available online in the Gazette, you will find that one of the reasons for casting aside the old promotions scheme was, in the words of the Hebdomadal Council and the old General Board, that the cash and numbers-limited promotions exercises which then existed generated 'wide-spread dissatisfaction' and 'a feeling of divisiveness', given that the criteria used to distinguish between successful but worthy candidates and their unsuccessful but worthy counterparts were non-transparent and hard to discern.

Now, the task force's proposal for regular rounds of promotions seems to be broader than the 1990s exercises. Annexe B of the consultation document suggests that the total number of lecturers across the University will diminish due to upward promotion, whether to reader or to professor, by some seventy in each three-year promotions round. However, what this means is that while the proportion which is likely to be successful in the promotions rounds will be broader than was the case in the rounds which took place until the mid-1990s, it will still not, for obvious and continuing financial reasons, be so broad as to catch all of those who are deserving, a possibility which is likely to be reinforced by the acknowledged tension between the regular promotions rounds and the proposal to allow for special ad hoc promotions to recruit and retain.

In particular, one can therefore imagine a rush of applications for the new personal posts at the start of the scheme, with the number of worthy but disappointed candidates being large. As the level and width of upset generated in the early 1990s shows, for a promotions scheme to generate confidence it must employ supremely transparent procedures and, as others have suggested today, I suspect these should not accord a decisive role to heads of department or faculty. If we fail to get the procedures right, it is possible that the scheme so helpfully proposed and I think so generally supported by the task force will be shorter-lived than deserves to be the case.

As Professor Fitzgerald has already hinted, the envisaged transitional period may also generate considerable complexity. Just think about it; we will continue to have the same number of statutory professors with different pay scales—CUFs and ULs—and no obligation to give undergraduate tutorials. We'll also have a growing number of personal professors appointed under the new scheme with extra pay but continuing UL and CUF teaching obligations, and, lurking around for the discernible future, quite a large, albeit diminishing, pool of titular readers and professors with ordinary CUF and UL teaching obligations and ordinary pay.

I tend to think, as a result of this, that the simplest and fairest way forward, given that our major competitors in North America do so, may simply be to give everyone, or at least everyone who is past the five-year probationary period, the title professor. Contrary to frequent assumption, this would allow us to continue to distinguish and to value the statutory chairs and also the holders of the new personal posts. Most major US universities have named chairs. The method of appointment is different from ours, but they are recognisable as distinct named chairs, held by individuals of enormous personal distinction. By analogy, we might continue under our new scheme to have distinct named chairs which were discernible, recognisable as such, even though others were called professor. Equally, personal professors could be known as university professors or faculty professors, again by analogy with the United States. This would, I am certain, be the fairest and least jumbled solution.

I hope, in closing, that these solutions would fit well with, and might even enhance, the proposals so helpfully made so far by the task force.

Dr I. Voiculescu (Computing Laboratory)

Vice-Chancellor, fellow members of Congregation, my name is Irina Voiculescu and I am a departmental lecturer in the Computing Laboratory. I'm here on behalf of a dozen or so colleagues who would like to raise awareness of this academic position. Despite our efforts to communicate with the task force, our post hardly features in the consultation documents.

Let me give you an idea of the kind of things we do: we lecture, run classes and practicals, we supervise and examine D.Phil students, we chair exam boards. I know of a departmental lecturer who is director of graduate studies, one who is director of a Master's programme and one who acted as head of his department. On the research front we are expected to lead projects, publish, write grant proposals, and we get included in the RAE.

Whilst we're here today for a discussion about career progression, and I will come to that in a minute, there are several fundamental issues which need to be clarified first. They are fundamental to the University's policy of equitable treatment of its academic staff. I refer here to the surprising fact that only some of us are members of Congregation. Only some have college affiliations, and only a select few are given a form of sabbatical leave, and yet there are no apparent criteria for any of these exclusions.

Another anomaly is that most of us continue to be, by default, on a pay scale which lies entirely below the main lecturer scale. There are no published criteria for this correlation, so we have no way in which to compare our situation to an agreed average. For example, I know of a departmental lecturer who publishes regularly in journals, has a book contract, sits on admission committees and convenes Master's courses. Last year, her line manager nominated her for a merit award. This scheme, even though applied to us, is designed for non-academic staff. The award was not granted because her performance was not deemed to be beyond expected standards.

We cannot discern any guidelines that determine our standard of work. We have requested repeatedly in the last eighteen months that generic descriptions be published for our posts. Personnel keeps telling us that generic descriptions do not exist in this University for roles where the primary requirement of the post is teaching.

Some of us have been fortunate enough to be regraded. The twenty-two-page form contained questions like: 'Which parts of your work involve considerable mental concentration, visual strain, manual handling or dexterity?' or: 'What are your main sources for gathering information and for what purpose are you gathering the information?' As for 'the most complex problem you have had to deal with', I was sorely tempted to describe the isomorphism problem in graph theory. Joking apart, these questions are not beneath my dignity, but are we really taken seriously as academics?

Yet another anomaly is that a few of us have got open-ended contracts, and this brings us back to the point of career progression. The Fixed-term Employees Regulations, which are precisely about the prevention of less favourable treatment, state that people on a second contract and with four years' service can regard their post/position as permanent. Yet there have been departmental lecturers in this University who, despite fulfilling this description, were never offered open-ended contracts.

It may be argued that our posts were initially designed as fixed-term and some of us became permanent lecturers inadvertently. The resulting teaching jobs are indeed open-ended but they give the holder little opportunity to develop a research career. Whether we stay or go, we end up being measured on the basis of our research output. Thus we are required to perform similarly to ULNTFs but with significantly different working conditions. The University needs to give careful thought, not only to what they want to call our post, but also to how it is going to treat its holders.

Regardless of the job title, the post needs to be designed with the future of the holder in mind, so we would like an assurance that these issues are going to be looked at. We would like an assurance that somebody will tackle them promptly and responsibly. Thank you.

Professor S. Cooper (St Catherine's College, Department of Physics)

Hello, everyone, I'm Susan Cooper. I begin that way for a reason. We make much in this University of the ideals of collegiality and the 'Republic of Letters', so I find it strange that we use titles so much among ourselves. Titles have their place, in particular externally, but they should not create an internal hierarchy, giving some academics more influence or power over others. I have heard much worry about this, although the task force has not proposed such a hierarchy, nor has our current system of titles created one. How we treat each other is for us to decide.

We are all different in many ways. Collegiality means treating each other with respect for our individual roles. What brought me to Oxford, and what has kept me here, despite the relative paucity of funding for my expensive research, is the big advantage of people working together. Maintaining that requires respect, and, above all, fairness.

Fairness is not easy to achieve. The simple solution of paying everyone the same is not fair to those arriving now, compared to those who bought a house thirty years ago. No system will be perfect, but we should try to do better than what we have now. Statutory professors and readers are invited by letter to apply for pay rises in a biennial 'gathered field' exercise. Eighty-five per cent are now receiving an average £20,000 a year as a result. There is no such invitation for lecturers, although in 2001, Congregation agreed to allow enhanced pay, and 109 people are now receiving an average of £12,000 a year. How did they get this? When I asked, I was told that heads of division are well aware of how the system works. What it really means is if you want a pay raise, you should apply for it, but not here, someplace else. Then bring your offer letter to your head of department and say you will leave if Oxford doesn't match it. The original intention, in 2001, was to allow enhanced pay for recruitment, retention and reward, but the reward part got lost. The task force proposals would bring it back in an openly announced 'gathered field' exercise. This is certainly an improvement.

Where I have problems is in a few of the details.

Apparently not enough women have applied for titles, so heads of department are to be required to nominate worthy candidates who haven't applied themselves. They already can, and do, encourage people to apply. Making it an official requirement, coupled with the need for fairness, can only mean regular mandatory performance review. Please don't use women as an excuse to bring that up again.

It is not wise to forget the original arguments for titles awarded on standards similar to those at other universities. Our finances don't allow us to do that if we tie them directly to increased pay. Yes, the current titles are empty in terms of pay, but they have significance outside Oxford, for example in the weight given, or not, to a letter of recommendation from an Oxford lecturer to help a former postdoc get a job or tenure abroad. It is not fair to have awarded titles on a freer basis for over a decade and then suddenly make it harder. It would be much better to keep the current standards for titles but to add to a higher standard, the possibility of higher pay.

If we value both teaching and research, a reward system needs to reward both. It is difficult to achieve parity with separate systems which differ widely in their prestige, as we have seen nationally with the RAE ratings dominating over what—the QAA?

The task force has made a good start, but its job is not yet done. I hope that the various speeches today and the consultation submissions in January will help it refine its promotions scheme so that it fits in well with the ideals of this University. Thank you.

Dr B.T.H. Huffman (Lady Margaret Hall, Department of Physics)

To my mind, how the decision is taken for award or promotion is more important than the details of what the award or title actually is. This is a process of selection that will create winners, but I do not oppose that outcome at all. Indeed, I fully support awards and promotions that are clearly earned and deserved.

However, the suggestions for creating the winners, as indicated in the task force documentation I have read, and in currently operating schemes, can generate problems, which are, first, an over-reliance on the patronage of one person or a small number of people. Secondly, we see an over-reliance on external advice. This is a great thing to help the University, but when externals essentially decide our promotions, then a wholly research-loaded reward scheme develops. Then we have to wrestle with the problem that no academic will wish to teach, or run a department, or take on the job of finding good graduate students, because of the poisoned chalice these service tasks represent. Next there is tick-boxing. To me, lists, targets and published outcomes always have the ring of false measures and over-mechanisation. In the tick-box world of business I find it hard to remember we're talking about human beings. And finally, self-promotion. As a British citizen of American persuasion I should be wholly in favour of self-promotion, but I'm not.

These are very difficult problems to solve in a top-down model, but Oxford has a different model—a democratic model—and it was this way of working that prompted my thoughts which I set down in the Magazine in Week 2.

Most of us are naturally working in our research and teaching lives in a group of between twenty and fifty academics. We call these groups faculties, departments, colleges, or sometimes sub-departments. Within these groups are colleagues who are working in fields related to our own. These departments all require us to maintain some active research, but also they require service, in order to operate as effective units for the admission of students, co-ordination of the field, teaching and many other areas. I submit that, within these groups, each and every one of us knows who should obtain recognition. That recognition can be for research, teaching, or service to the department or University.

Consequently, I would like to propose a process that is modelled upon the principles underpinning this University—democratic principles—and also assuming that merit is the only criterion. In every promotion or award period for academics, all the academics within a department are given a list of eligible colleagues and asked to suggest two names which would be considered for awards or promotion. The first name should be the person in the department you feel has promoted your field in research the best. The second name should be the person in the department who you feel has done the greatest service to the department. It must be absolutely illegal to put your own name forward for either of these positions. The names are collected, ranked on the basis of the number, and then the ranked list sent to the divisional board for recommendation of promotion by research or service.

Of course, any system of voting can be subject to pathologies if the number of voters is too small or if too many refuse to participate. I believe, though, that the implied incentives of promotions and awards will certainly receive the attention of our colleagues and will enjoy broad participation. Clearly, some departments or faculties are too small for this scheme to function properly, but I would not wish the perfect to be the enemy of the good. Surely a scheme that could function well for more than half of this University ought to be tried, where appropriate.

So I would like to suggest that we, as academics, are well suited and qualified to choose from our own membership those who we feel deserve recognition. We, then, are the creators of our own inequities. We have a stake in their creation. Meanwhile, those who receive recognition can take great pride in the fact that their efforts are admired and recognised by their peers. I believe such sentiments are reinforcing to the ideals of a collegiate environment of scholarship and research and would serve this unique institution well. Thank you.

Mr G.P. Williams (St Peter's College, Department of Politics and International Relations)

Vice-Chancellor, colleagues. May I commend to members of Congregation the debate on 14 March 2001, which others have already alluded to, on the statute concerning the salaries of academic staff, and not just because of my own contribution to that debate. The preamble was approved by 542 votes to 392 against. The basic principles, quoting selectively, were that: 'The holders of all academic posts shall be paid under standard arrangements, to be determined from time to time by Council, provided that this shall not prevent the payment of additional emoluments in the form of awards in recognition of academic distinction or contribution to the academic work of the University'. 'Academic' is not defined as being limited to research achievements to the exclusion of teaching and, most importantly, and too often overlooked, graduate supervision as criteria for merit awards. It made provision, in cases of recruitment and retention, for heads of divisions to make the case for payments in individual cases in terms of the academic importance of so doing, and to provide firm evidence that the award would not lead to unacceptable salary anomalies within the division. I'll come back to that point.

These principles, whether one likes them or not—I didn't then and I still don't—have been approved by Congregation before. As we have heard, they raise difficult and perhaps unavoidable problems, firstly of equity, of relations among colleagues, of procedures, but also, of course, of internal consistency, if they are actually not to lead to unacceptable salary anomalies. If this is to be achieved, procedures, I suggest, must firstly be applied according to rules that are clear and simple, and I'd suggest that the task force's specific proposals are somewhat convoluted. Secondly, the rules must enable all academic staff to apply for awards. All applications must be considered by the same criteria, on the same scales—whether we're talking about people currently holding posts, as those who are being offered jobs, or paid to stay with us. And finally, the same committee of elected and unelected members—the same independent committee—must advise the Vice-Chancellor on all applications and on all instances of salary enhancement. Thank you, Mr Vice-Chancellor.

Dr C.A.R. Boyd (Brasenose College, Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics)

Vice-Chancellor, colleagues. I have three points and I will be brief.

I think we should be extremely grateful to the task force, for both its thoughtfulness, as in the data collection and on its Web site, and additionally, oddly, for its lack of haste. This debate is a real opportunity to discuss and reflect on the proposals that they've suggested.

My second point is perhaps more philosophical. I was opposed to the titular process embarked on some fifteen years ago. However, our democratic process approved the scheme that we have and, as a believer in our democratic governance, I accept the consequences of the University embarking on a road that Anthony Trollope had so wittily described, albeit in an unambiguously non-PC manner: 'I have heard it said that in this country the man of letters is not recognised. I believe the meaning of this to be that men of letters are not often invited to be knights and baronets. I do not think that they wish it;— and, if they had, it would, as a body, lose more weight than they would gain. I do not desire at all to have letters put after my name or to be called Sir Anthony, but if my friends Tom Hughes and Charles Reade became Sir Thomas and Sir Charles, I do not know how I would feel,—or my wife might feel. As it is ... the man of letters receives the general respect from those around him and finds this to be much more pleasant recognition of his worth.' I think there is still some relevance of this Victorian perspective to the current debate, particularly the notion that the University's values should be more than the sum of individual aspirations—'as a body we would lose more'—and the realisation that it is recognition by colleagues that produces fulfilment, both of the individual and coherence of an intellectual body.

My final point: the direction of travel suggested by the task force includes the 'Cambridge route', and I think the task force's thinking here is a deep challenge to the University, yet it's a challenge that really matters, oddly, to rather few members of this body (I estimate that perhaps a third of the current members of Congregation—that is, those who will still be here in twenty years or so, when the new steady state, I work out and guess, will have been reached). I will wish them to be the ones particularly involved in making the decision on the task force's final proposals, a decision that will determine in part the nature of the University that they will wish to belong to. Rather like (in a previous skirmish from another generation) dividing the undivided second-class degree, if they do wish to proceed down this route, they need to realise some of the challenges that will then ensue: the challenge of dividing the community into sheep and goats more or less down the middle of the academic population, and of doing so in a community that has a commitment to scholarship of a somewhat unfashionable sort, research that's long-term, and where research and teaching have a nexus. These individuals may well be right to support the final recommendations of the task force, but they do need to have thought through whether future frictions within the University will emerge if they are adopted.

Most of us, on entering academic life and academic community like to think that we are indeed the future Miltons or Newtons. Many of us are in fact the Tom Hugheses or the Charles Reades, and some merely Richard Boyds. Actually, and oddly, we need all of them.

VICE-CHANCELLOR: Thank you. Might I thank all those who have spoken thus far. I have worked through the list of those who notified us of their desire to speak. Are there other members who would like to address Congregation? Thank you.

Professor W.J. Blair (Queen's College, Faculty of History)

Mr Vice-Chancellor and members of Congregation, I would like to make a different and much more general point. Dr Heal referred earlier to flexibility of duties and I would like to return to that issue. I've been a supporter of the task force's work and objectives and I'd like to add my own thanks to their efforts in their very difficult task, but I am a bit disappointed by the order of priorities that has emerged.

In the proposals, and in today's discussions, a great deal has been said about titles and money, but not much has been said about time. Many Oxford academics don't care about titles. I won't say that many don't care about money, but I do think that the attraction of working in Oxford is less financial, indeed certainly less honorific, than simply the opportunity to enjoy a rewarding balance of research and teaching in a rewarding environment, and I think that a very large problem among the problems faced by Oxford is simply that very many people are very overburdened. In Week 6 of Michaelmas Term, I think that many of us here will already be feeling very tired and I had hoped that overburdening on a broad front would be a more prominent theme in the proposals.

I'm emphatically not advocating the reduction of the teaching given to undergraduates, and I fully agree with what Dr Thompson said on that point, but I do think that relief of burdens across the board, rather than just for a minority, can be achieved without doing that, if money is applied to it. This is a matter of priorities, and I urge the task force to put it higher on its own order of priorities.

Mr A. Murray (University College)

Alexander Murray, former Tutorial Fellow at University College. I'm only venturing to add to the wise words that have been said today because I've felt throughout the discussion that I'm a heretic—that I'm the one really radical republican. Dr Boyd said that he admired the democratic system and therefore he stood by the decision from some years ago to have merit awards, but I'm a democrat too, and I don't see why democrats can't reverse previous decisions. I think that it has been damaging to the University to have these distinctions. A friend of mine, whom I know well but who didn't want to be named, came here after refusing what was about the most prestigious job he could have had in an American university because Oxford had that corporate dignity which he was proud to participate in, and when in foreign conferences everybody else is called 'professor', he's proud to say: civis Romanus sum, I come from a different sort of organisation and one which has in the past, as people say, punched far above its weight, partly because of the way that we're constructed.

I've heard so many phrases in the speeches that have been made—speeches which, let me say, I admire enormously for their structure and their references—so many phrases like, 'in this century', 'coming forward', 'it's time to change', 'younger generation', and so on, and 'what other universities do', and 'they don't understand', and I think that we should be prouder of our tradition and what we've done. Well, there are so many things that I could say on this subject but I'm content really to have stated that I feel reservations about all the positions that have been taken so far, because they are eroding that principle.

When my undergraduates have talked to me and said: 'What shall we do, what are we going to be, what job shall I take on?', I say the important question to ask is not what do you want to be, but what do you want to do, because that's what you'll be doing every day. Now, it seems to me that the university structure should lay down what a job is—whether it's a tutorial fellow, a reader, or a professor—and if you want that job, you apply for it and then you strive throughout your career to do it, and you will never do it properly. There are rare moments, as a tutorial fellow, when you feel something has gone really well, but you're always trying to do it better, and teach the new generation. Now, that doesn't actually admit any room for 'recognitions of distinction'. There may be financial problems and I think that they should be dealt with separately—some people have families which are large, and so on—they can be dealt with separately. There are also problems, superficially, in some people's careers, when they go outside the University and have to be called Dr instead of Professor or Mr instead of Professor. I think that one actually can also be solved in the way that I've already indicated: by being proud of our institution, that it doesn't actually have the same nomenclature and system as all the others and this is an attraction.

We say we want to keep and attract good people. Well, the friend that I refer to was attracted to Oxford, and I've heard many other people, I know there are several, in this room, probably, but I've heard in previous Congregations, other people who have been drawn here because of the peculiar quality of Oxford, and I don't think we should go on eroding it as we have. Well, I've made myself clear and thank you all for listening.

Professor G. Rodriguez-Pereyra (Oriel College, Faculty of Philosophy)

Mr Vice-Chancellor, members of the Congregation. Two points. In paragraph 9 of this document it says that the criteria for promotion will include excellence in teaching and research and, in some cases, excellence in administration and management might be a factor. I disagree, because I think the title of professor and the title of reader is an eminently academic title, and so although I do agree that excellence in management and excellence in administration should be rewarded, I don't think it should be rewarded with the title of professor or reader.

And the second point I would like to make is in relation to this proposal that heads of department will be required to nominate people if they think that nominating those people prevents the creation of an imbalance. I think that that is bringing in extra-academic considerations to an exercise which should be purely academic, and heads of department should nominate people if and only if they think those people deserve to be nominated, and even if they think that nominating them will create an imbalance of some kind or another. Thank you.

VICE-CHANCELLOR: Thank you. Does any other member wish to speak? If not, I should like to ask Dame Fiona Caldicott if she would like to make any final points to conclude the discussion.

Dame Fiona Caldicott (Principal of Somerville College)

Thank you, Vice-Chancellor. I would just like to thank all those who have spoken and all who have come today at what I know is a very busy time of term. I have been very impressed by the thoughtfulness of all the contributions and I can assure you that the task force will certainly reflect on everything that has been said and look at our current proposals in the light of them.

One of the things I regret about this afternoon is that it hasn't been possible to have more interaction between those who have spoken and the silent majority, and I think we need to think about the title of 'discussion' and how we actually promote discussion, rather than a number of speeches.

In any event, the consultative document is available on our Web site, as are frequently asked questions and answers and I do encourage everyone who is here today to look at the downloadable recording of the discussion. There's plenty of food for thought, and obviously reading the verbatim transcript, either online or in the Gazette, will inform responses that come to the task force in the middle of January.

So I'd like to thank everyone very much indeed for their contributions and their thoughtfulness, to assure you that our work will continue, and although I don't want to respond to individual points, I can't resist saying to Professor Blair that we will, of course, think more carefully about workload. It has been very high on our list of priorities; it's just that we thought our first proposal should be on one matter. The proposals about workload are currently being worked upon with the divisions of the University and I hope that there will be a public document about that in the very near future, so thank you for that thought. Thank you, Vice-Chancellor.

VICE-CHANCELLOR: Might I again thank all speakers for their participation this afternoon and for their thoughtfulness and their guidance to the task force and to Council. Might I also thank all of those of you who have been present for sharing the discussion with us.

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