logo
Troubled Scots uni's new finance chief quits after EIGHT DAYS

Troubled Scots uni's new finance chief quits after EIGHT DAYS

Scottish Sun02-07-2025
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
THE new finance chief of Dundee University has quit just eight days into the job.
Chris Reilly was appointed to the senior position last month for a period of 18 months.
Sign up for Scottish Sun
newsletter
Sign up
2
The new interim finance director of Dundee University has quit his role
Credit: Michael Schofield, News Group Newspapers Ltd
Uni chiefs hailed his arrival and said he comes with a "wealth of experience".
But after just over a week in the hot seat, Mr Reilly has left his role at the troubled institution "by mutual agreement".
The new interim university principal, Professor Nigel Seaton, told staff of Mr Reilly's departure.
In an email to workers, he wrote: "Dear colleagues, I am writing to let you know that Chris Reilly, our Interim Chief Finance Officer, has left the University by mutual agreement.
"We are moving quickly to appoint a new Interim Director of Finance who will take us through the next steps of the University Recovery Plan for submission to the Scottish Funding Council.
"We will share further information about this process with you as soon as possible."
Bosses at Dundee Uni will now have to find their fourth finance chief in less than a year amid a financial crisis.
Mr Reilly replaced former interim finance director Helen Simpson after she worked just seven months in her post.
Last October, her predecessor Peter Fotheringham quit shortly before the state of the university's finances emerged.
Last week, ex-interim principal Shane O'Neill quit shortly after the release of a scathing report into management's handling of the crisis.
Major Scots university to axe 632 jobs as staff left 'in tears'
Last week, we told how former boss Iain Gillespie refuses to give back his £150,000 pay-off.
The former principal and vice chancellor left as Dundee Uni went into meltdown.
He later admitted to MSPs that he had been "incompetent" during a Holyrood grilling.
Last month, the Scottish Government handed the uni an extra £40million in emergency funding.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Savvy shoppers race to Claire's for ‘closing down' sales where earrings cost a PENNY as company file for administration
Savvy shoppers race to Claire's for ‘closing down' sales where earrings cost a PENNY as company file for administration

Scottish Sun

time42 minutes ago

  • Scottish Sun

Savvy shoppers race to Claire's for ‘closing down' sales where earrings cost a PENNY as company file for administration

EAR THIS Savvy shoppers race to Claire's for 'closing down' sales where earrings cost a PENNY as company file for administration Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) SHOPPERS are racing to get their hands on a piece of their childhood, as a wave of bargain hunting takes over social media. Following the news that Claire's has collapsed into administration, a frenzy of viral videos shows customers swarming stores to grab heavily discounted items. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 2 Shoppers are racing to Claire's to get their hands on some bargain items Credit: Alamy One such shopper, TikToker Shivani Khosla, who is known as 'khoslaa', shared a video of her rushing over to the high-street store, which was a staple for many Brits growing up. While explaining how she got her ears pierced at Claire's when she was five-years-old she filmed the inside of her local Claire's and challenged herself to see what she can get for £10. Shivani discovered that "right now, there is a sale. If you buy three items, you get the fourth one completely free." Her video gained 597.1k views and 491 comments after just two days of being shared. One person wrote: "Guys we need to save Claire's." Another TikToker who is known as 'toosexc4diswrld' revealed that they even got a pair of earrings for a penny. Her video gained 2.6 million views and 866 comments after three days of being shared. One person wrote: "I'm going to miss this store." Nostalgic 90's retailer files for bankruptcy after chain misses rent payments for June and July The beloved high-street brand officially collapsed into administration, but all 306 stores across the UK and Ireland are set to remain open, with no jobs lost under the current plans. However, a number of changes will impact shoppers directly. Online orders have been suspended, and any outstanding orders that have not yet been shipped will be cancelled. Customers who placed these orders can expect to receive a refund. Meanwhile, orders that have already been dispatched will arrive as usual. In a further blow to customers, Claire's is no longer processing refunds for returns. Shoppers who have items to return may need to contact their credit or debit card provider to see if they can obtain a refund. Consultancy firm Interpath has appointed Will Wright and Chris Pole as joint administrators to manage the struggling company. 2 Khoslaa headed to her local Claire's store Credit: tiktok/@khoslaa Mr Wright said: "Claire's has long been a popular brand across the UK, known not only for its trend-led accessories but also as the go-to destination for ear piercing. "Over the coming weeks, we will endeavour to continue to operate all stores as a going concern for as long as we can, while we assess options for the company. "This includes exploring the possibility of a sale which would secure a future for this well-loved brand." The current situation follows the Claire's parent company's second bankruptcy filing in the US this month, having previously declared itself bust over unpaid loans in 2018. Global presence Although Claire's has a global presence with 2,750 stores across 17 countries, reports suggest that the UK branch is not expected to find a buyer. A senior insolvency expert noted that potential buyers, such as Hilco Capital, have recently withdrawn their offers upon realising the severity of the chain's financial issues. Claire's UK division has faced financial difficulties, incurring losses of £25 million over the last three years. In the year ending March 2024, the company recorded a loss of £4.7 million, a slight improvement from the £5 million loss reported the year before. During the same period, its turnover declined to £137 million.

Whining about Scottish ‘austerity' is baseless, absurd and idiotic
Whining about Scottish ‘austerity' is baseless, absurd and idiotic

Times

time42 minutes ago

  • Times

Whining about Scottish ‘austerity' is baseless, absurd and idiotic

Like Christmas and birthdays, the annual GERS festival seems to arrive sooner than you think. Has a year really passed since the last edition of the Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland figures was published? Why, yes it has. This year's numbers are remarkable, best accompanied by an indecently large dram of cask-strength liquor. For public spending in and for Scotland amounted to 52 per cent of Scottish GDP last year. That is lower than in France, Finland, Belgium and Austria but higher than in every other European country. Public spending in Sweden and Denmark, for instance, equals 48 per cent of GDP. In Norway, the figure is 46 per cent. Further afield, other countries with which the Scottish government sometimes likes to compare Scotland contrive to thrive with a much smaller public sector. Public spending in New Zealand is 42 per cent of GDP. This is the context in which to understand the claims made by Scottish government ministers that Scotland is once again enduring some form of 'austerity'. And the thing to understand about this whining is that it is baseless, absurd and idiotic. This is a country of Big Government. If government departments and other agencies struggle to meet their obligations despite this obvious largesse it is because they are inefficiently or incompetently run and because ministers lack the courage to say 'No' to demands for more and more spending. Mercifully, Scottish taxpayers are not required to pay for all of this. In 2024-25, £91.4 billion was raised in taxes in Scotland but government spending amounted to £117.6 billion. This is a notional deficit — notional because Scotland is part of the United Kingdom — of some £26.5 billion. That is equivalent to 11.7 per cent of GDP. John Swinney should pray to the ghost of the late Joel Barnett every night for it is his eponymous formula that grants Scotland its privileged place within the United Kingdom: a relatively wealthy part of the realm funded as though it were a poor one. By way of illustrating the scale of Scotland's deficit, it may be worthing noting that last year Zimbabwe ran a deficit equal to 10.4 per cent of GDP. Indeed, according to data compiled by the International Monetary Fund, the only independent countries running real deficits greater than Scotland's notional one are East Timor, Kiribati, the Maldives and Ukraine. At this point nationalists will customarily enter the chat to say that, look, GERS only tells us about Scotland's current fiscal position and of course an independent Scotland would do things differently. This is true. GERS offers a snapshot of the position from which an independent Scotland would begin life and GERS also makes it very clear that many things would have to be done very differently in an independent Scotland. To start with you would begin with something like £10 billion in tax increases and around another £10 billion in spending cuts. That would still leave Scotland running a deficit like most countries but it would be a manageable one of around 3 per cent of GDP. That, you will also recall, is the price of admission to the European Union. Every existing tax would doubtless be increased and new taxes created (on this front, if few others, Scotland's political class is endlessly resourceful). But to give an indication of the scale of tax hikes required, £10 billion is about half of total income tax receipts in Scotland last year. Swingeing tax increases of this sort would almost certainly encourage capital flight of a sort this country can ill afford. Just 5 per cent of Britain's top-rate tax-payers live in Scotland which is one reason why although Scotland has 8 per cent of the UK population it contributes just 6.8 per cent of income tax revenue. Tax increases of this sort, however, would only get the job half done. You would still need to cut £10 billion of public spending. That is roughly equivalent to 50 per cent of the NHS budget. Good luck winning an independence referendum on that manifesto. • The facts of life are demanding chiels. It is too often and too easily forgotten that in the years after the 2008 financial crisis Scotland's notional deficit was broadly the same as the UK's real one and, in some years and thanks to buoyant oil revenues, Scotland's relative fiscal position was marginally healthier than the UK's. This was unusual and atypical but it allowed Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon to sell independence as a financial opportunity, not, as it obviously is now, a giant leap into an enormous fiscal black hole. Even then, all lilies had to be gilded. As Sturgeon relates in her new memoir, oil prices were then high but Salmond 'spent a lot of time persuading the government economists to push their projections higher, raking them to the outer edges of credibility'. In other words, the Yes campaign suborned officials to present a fantastical vision of the riches an independent Scotland would enjoy. This is something worth remembering. The SNP are doubtless happy to win without lying but why take that risk when untruths may buttress the liberation cause? Economic self-interest does not always prevail and voters may cheerfully vote for their own impoverishment but, even so, this year's GERS festival is a reminder that the appeal of independence is for the time being strictly notional and hypothetical. That imaginary Scotland is a comfortable place to dwell but the nature of today's fiscal realities is such that even SNP politicians might be wary of asking the national question again. This is why, in the end, they are comfortable not asking it, for no amount of creative accountancy can make these sums add up.

Scotland's deficit grows by £5.1bn, Gers figures show
Scotland's deficit grows by £5.1bn, Gers figures show

North Wales Chronicle

time2 hours ago

  • North Wales Chronicle

Scotland's deficit grows by £5.1bn, Gers figures show

The latest Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (Gers) figures reported 'overall public finances in Scotland weakening, as expenditure grew faster than revenue'. For 2024-25, Scotland has a net fiscal deficit of minus £26.5 billion – an increase of £5.1 billion from the previous year – with this the representing minus 11.7% of the country's GDP. The UK deficit for 2024-25 was minus 5.1% of GDP, less than half the rate of Scotland. The Scottish Government report said the 'deterioration' between this year and last was in part linked to a fall in North Sea revenue, but it added: 'The difference is primarily explained by movements in non-North Sea revenue and spending, with Scottish revenue growing more slowly and Scottish expenditure growing more quickly than the UK.' Revenue in Scotland grew by 1.5% in 2024-25 to £91.4 billion. Spending increased to £117.6 billion in 2024-25, up from £111.4 billion in 2023-24. 'As a share of GDP, public spending remained at historically high levels in 2024,' the report noted. Scottish Secretary Ian Murray said the figures show Scots benefit from higher public spending than the UK average – with this £2,669 more per person north of the border. He said this 'means more money for schools, hospitals and policing, if the Scottish Parliament chooses to invest in those areas' – although he also claimed 'people in Scotland will rightly expect to see better outcomes' for these higher spending levels. Mr Murray said: 'These figures underline the collective economic strength of the United Kingdom and how Scotland benefits from the redistribution of wealth inside the UK. 'By sharing resources with each other across the UK, Scots benefit by £2,669 more per head in public spending than the UK average. 'It also means that devolved governments have the financial heft of the wider UK behind them when taking decisions.' Scottish Finance Secretary Shona Robison said decisions taken by ministers at Holyrood 'are helping support sustainable public finances'. She said: 'For the fourth year in a row, devolved revenues have grown faster than devolved expenditure. 'Scotland's public finances are better than many other parts of the UK, with the third highest revenue per person in the UK, behind only London and the South East.' She also stressed the Gers statistics reflect the current constitutional arrangements, with Scotland part of the UK and 'not an independent Scotland with its own policy, decisions on defence spending and the economy'. Arguing the figures highlight the 'limit' of devolved powers, Ms Robison said while the Scottish Government is responsible for more than 60% of public expenditure north of the border, it only controls 'around 30% of revenue'. The Finance Secretary told journalists: 'As an independent Scotland we would have the powers to make different choices, different budgetary results, to build a stronger economy and enable Scotland to be a fairer, wealthier and greener country.' She pointed to Ireland, saying GDP there had grown 12.5% over the last year, with a budget surplus of 24 billion euros (£20.7 billion) in 2024. Ms Robison hailed that as an example of 'what a small independent country, one of our nearest neighbours, is able to do with the full powers of independence'. She said: 'What we want, through the powers of independence, is to be able to make our own decisions. 'If you look at Ireland and what they have been able to do with the powers they have, it's like night and day compared to the economic conditions of the UK economy or the Scottish economy. 'Independence is the direction we want to take because we believe it will unleash the potential, from day one, to be able to emulate some of the economic performance of many of our neighbours, whether it is Ireland, or some of our Scandinavian neighbours.'

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store