Pandemic bites into university chiefs’ pay packets

Universities are moving to end the era of million-dollar salaries for top executives.

Newly appointed vice-chancellor Mark Scott with chancellor Belinda Hutchinson at the University of Sydney. Picture: Britta Campion

Australian universities are moving to end the era of million-dollar salaries for their top executives as University of Sydney chancellor Belinda Hutchinson leads the way in sparking a sector-wide “reset” of vice-chancellor pay packets.

University of Adelaide vice-chancellor Peter Hoj and Australian Catholic University vice-chancellor Zlatko Skrbis will be paid thousands of dollars less than their predecessors, after taking over their institutions during the COVID crisis.

It comes as former ABC managing director Mark Scott prepares to take over as vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney, taking a 40 per cent pay cut compared to the $1.6m predecessor Michael Spence received.

A host of other universities, including the Australian National University, La Trobe University and the Queensland University of Technology. are also extending COVID-induced pay cuts, reviewing salaries and freezing pay rises.

Ms Hutchinson said Mr Scott had allowed the University of Sydney to lead the way in reducing vice-chancellor pay.

“With Mark coming on board we felt there was a real opportunity for leadership in the sector and to do a reset,” she said on Friday. “I think what we’ve come up with is a very appropriately pitched level of remuneration.”

Ms Hutchinson’s move comes after The Australian revealed in December that university chancellors were planning a new code to govern chiefs’ pay in response to public unease at vice-chancellors’ remuneration.

Mr Scott will earn a base salary of $982,800 a year, with a potential bonus raising his salary to $1.15m.

In Adelaide, Professor Hoj will be paid less than the $1.1m his predecessor, Peter Rathjen, received in 2019. A University of Adelaide spokesman also said Professor Hoj — who was paid up to $1.2m when he ran the University of Queensland — will also get less than the $1.17m Flinders vice-chancellor Colin Stirling was paid in 2019 and the $1.18m University of South Australia boss David Lloyd received the same year.

Australian Catholic University chief operating officer Stephen Weller said Professor Skrbis, who took the job in January, would be paid $965,000 this year compared to predecessor Greg Craven’s $1.34m package in 2020.

The University of Sydney move on Friday was in contrast to the University of Melbourne and Monash University, where 2020 pay cuts to vice-chancellor salaries have been rescinded.

Monash vice-chancellor Margaret Gardner and Melbourne vice-chancellor Duncan Maskell are set to return to their 2019 salaries of $1.3m this year.

National Tertiary Education Union president Alison Barnes said the reversal in pay cuts at Melbourne and Monash, and the still substantial salary of Mr Scott, were out of touch with the post-COVID struggles of the university workforce.

“It’s staggering you can have vice-chancellors on more than $1m when their workers have ¬little employment benefits, can only take modest holidays, and many have lost their jobs during the pandemic,” she said on Friday.

“And it beggars belief that in this sector — which faces its worst crisis ever — that some vice-chancellors would roll back their pay cuts. It’s incredibly tone deaf.”

More than 12,000 university workers have lost their jobs in the past year and the sector was rocked by revelations of millions of dollars in wage theft.

The University of Melbourne was forced to repay more than 1500 academics last year, after it was found staff in its School of Arts were underpaid by nearly $6m.

The salary cut for the University of Sydney vice-chancellor job came after a January report from a NSW parliamentary committee sheeted home responsibility to university chancellors and their governing councils for the “vast disparity” between the salaries of university leaders and those who actually carried out university teaching and research.

The pressure will now be on University of NSW to hire a cheaper vice-chancellor when incumbent Ian Jacobs returns to Britain at the end of the year. Professor Jacobs is paid $1.3m and took a 20 per cent pay cut in 2020.

An ANU spokesman said vice-chancellor Brian Schmidt had taken another 10 per cent pay cut this year after he reduced his salary by 20 per cent in 2020.

La Trobe vice-chancellor John Dewar and Central Queensland University vice-chancellor Nick Klomp will both extend a COVID-sparked 20 per cent pay cut until the middle of this year

Queensland University of Technology vice-chancellor Margaret Sheil has taken a 10 per cent pay cut this year.