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subtext | Truth: lies open to all Issue 158 - ‘the goalkeeper’s fear of the penalty’ 16/02/2017 ***************************************************** Fortnightly during term time. Letters, contributions, & comments: subtext-editors@lancaster.ac.uk Back issues & subscription details: www.lancs.ac.uk/subtext In this issue: editorial; footballgate; more footballgate; again, footballgate; spinal blockage; REF audit; brexit learnings; alt-free speech; overheard at lancaster; and now for something completely different - footballgate; UCU; stools; VC visits; more blockage; LUSU democracy; gig review; letters. ***************************************************** EDITORIAL Last season, football witnessed perhaps the biggest surprise in the sporting world. Leicester City Football Club, after narrowly avoiding relegation the previous season, won the Premier League title. At odds of 5000 to 1, nobody saw it coming. Until the result of the Spurs vs. Chelsea game confirmed it, no one believed it would happen. But it did, and people talked about the romance and joy surrounding the beautiful game. However, it wasn’t long before it was business as usual in the football world. Scandal, hypocrisy, gambling, corruption, exposes, shady money deals, lies, deceit, as well as a lack of communication with staff, and owners riding roughshod over supporters and pushing a market-driven model of business. Enter Lancaster University. Our lead story concerns the potentially huge investment and expansion that the University seems to be about to embark on in conjunction with the so-called ‘Class of ‘92’, a group of former Manchester United footballers. When the story broke in the Manchester Evening News, the University issued the following statement: 'You may have seen the story in the media about a potential new university venture backed by former footballer Gary Neville and the Class of 92. Lancaster [...] is still evaluating its feasibility. No decision has yet been made to proceed or otherwise. Council and Senate have been fully informed confidentially of these discussions as they have taken place. Staff [...] will be kept informed as the discussions develop to the stage when there is a potential proposition, if we reach that stage'. These statements came as a surprise, in particular the suggestion that this is still at the 'feasibility stage'. The national press has reported that the Class of ‘92 and the University had gone as far as to draw up a list of potential subject offerings, identify potential sites, and make projections of student numbers. This would suggest that the process has long transcended the blue-sky thinking over a pie and a pint stage. Furthermore, if you look at the Senate and Council minutes (that are available online for all to see) going back to June 2016, there is a recurrent, restricted minute titled 'Strategic Partnership Opportunity: Approval and Next Steps'. Unless we are currently negotiating multiple strategic partnerships, one can reasonably deduce that these minutes refer to the Gary Neville University. In each instance, these items are marked 'FOR DISCUSSION REQUIRING DECISION'. We wonder what decisions were being called for, if 'no decisions have yet been made'. It all sounds like the University has embraced the normal way business and relations are conducted in the murky world of football. This is a world where football celebrity and the media go hand-in-hand, where public scandal is but a tabloid headline away. The celebrities invariably bounce back, but for a university of Lancaster’s standing the potential reputational damage could be fatal. ***************************************************** SPECIAL REPORT: STRATEGIC EMBARRASSMENT OPPORTUNITY The Manchester Evening News is not normally the go-to place to find out about a major, potentially costly, new initiative by Lancaster University. Yet this is precisely where the story broke that Lancaster has plans to set up a Salford-based 'alternative' educational institution in partnership with ‘The Class of ‘92’, a group of former Manchester United footballers (Gary Neville, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes and Nicky Butt) who are spending their retirement in the world of property development. The story has since been picked up by other news venues, including The Times, and at the time of writing was even considered worthy of a small item on the LU staff intranet front page. It says something about our internal communications, as well as the increasingly opaque operations of University management, when our entire academic community is first informed of such a monumental financial, academic, and reputational risk by a throwaway story in the M.E.N. So why, concerned readers might ask, is it in fact a risk for Lancaster to get together with these strange bedfellows? Well, for a start, speaking of bedfellows, there is the reputation of the footballers themselves. While some footballers currently seem to be recasting themselves as paragons of civic society (Gary Lineker’s spat with the Daily Mail over Calais refugees comes to mind), some of the Class of ‘92’s graduates have... less salubrious reputations (Ryan Giggs, for example). It is not hard to envision some future scandal that would lead to oodles of opprobrium for one or more of the footballers, whose names would at that point be inextricably linked with our hallowed institution. Even at present, there’s also the small matter of the Class of 92’s promotion of a ‘Lingerie Football League’ [http://tinyurl.com/jp2pacq], a story which speaks for itself. *** A further risk inherent in associating with the Class of ’92 is that their property development in Manchester is making them very unpopular with locals. Just recently, their plans to erect a pair of skyscrapers on Bootle Street in Manchester (replacing the Sir Ralph Abercrombie pub, the last remaining structure from the Peterloo massacre of 1819) was met with a furious backlash and a petition from locals who feared that the development was 'grossly inappropriate for its location'. Elsewhere, the East Salford Community Committee and local residents have vociferously opposed the Class of ‘92’s plans to demolish Salford City FC’s stadium and replace it with a whole new one, citing a lack of consultation, over-development, inadequate parking and noise as causes for concern. The Class of ‘92 began their Manchester real estate careers by establishing the Hotel Football and Café Football operations under the ownership of their Old Trafford Supporters Club company, which was in turn owned by the boys’ holding company, Orchid Leisure, registered in the British Virgin Islands. However, it was the link to Singapore-based billionaire Peter Lim that really saw their fortunes soar. In November 2015 Lim acquired a 75% stake in Orchid Leisure and the boys’ other holdings for the sum of £29.1M (through Incanto, another British Virgin Islands-based company) and a 50% share of Salford City FC. Readers will no doubt be aware of the role of the British Virgin Islands in hosting the enormous swathe of tax-avoidance operations exposed in the Panama Papers. Lim made a lot of his money from paper pulp, palm oil plantations and other industries that tend to rely on destroying virgin tropical rainforest, displacing indigenous people and destroying habitats of orangutans and other endangered species, although his companies claim to have cleaned up their act recently. His stake in the Gary Neville University is likely to be considerable. *** It is probably not mere coincidence that news of this partnership should come at a time when the Lords is still debating a HE Bill that will open the sector up to more private/alternative provision. Universities minister Jo ‘Jojo’ Johnson has been clear that one of his key aims is to expand the number of alternative providers within the HE sector. Speaking at a Universities UK conference back in 2015, Jojo said the government 'must continue to open up the higher education market'. Lancaster appears to making moves to sign up new players in the sector before the transfer window officially opens, a somewhat hypocritical move given the VC’s recent carping about private educational providers undermining our business. But there are risks to seeking out untested talent. The alternative provision sector is notorious in quality circles for high-profile gaffes. Manchester itself has form. According to the THE, the now-defunct Manchester College of Higher Education and Media Technology, for example, had demanded that its master’s level students have the ability to identify scissors and tape measures among its assessment criteria. Jokes about footballers’ intelligence are cheap and petty, but there can be legitimate concerns about how academically thorough such a venture may be. And while talk of failure and reputation damage may seem premature, it is worth remembering that the HE White Paper openly acknowledged that, in a competitive sector, some institutions will fail, and the government has no responsibility for that. What’s more, the Bill seeks to make it easier for new providers to gain degree awarding powers. It is not inconceivable that if the footballers’ academy is successful they may choose to ditch Lancaster’s accreditation, and attempt to forge their own path - like a superstar brought up through the youth team, who promptly abandons their home side at the first sniff of glory. *** It doesn’t feel like long ago that Lancaster wasn’t taking the idea of running sports and vocational studies terribly seriously – indeed, our Music degree was rather snootily likened to sporting degrees when the department’s demise was justified in Senate. It’s hard to know how seriously this new academy will be taken by the prospective students, staff or institutional and industry partners the University is trying to woo. The location of this new academy would be right on the doorstep of institutions that already offer some of the same provision, such as Manchester Metropolitan, Bolton and Salford University, the latter of which is particularly renowned for its media and journalism degrees. As if that weren’t enough, Salford even awarded Neville an honorary doctorate in 2014. Meanwhile, just up the road there are the likes of UCLan and Cumbria, which have a similar hold on this academic area. How this upstart academy (which is certainly going to be tarnished by its perceived status as a private university run by a bunch of footballers) will find its footing in such a location is a mystery to subtext, and strikes us as a massive financial risk that isn’t worth taking. Nearby universities aren’t going to hold back on encouraging prospective students to dismiss the 'Gary Neville University', and Lancaster’s attempts to encroach on their turf is sure to make us unpopular. subtext will endeavour to continue our coverage of this proposal as it develops. In the meantime, in lieu of a broad consultation exercise from the university, we welcome opinions from readers on this fascinating story. ***************************************************** THE CLUES WERE THERE So - could we have spotted this story earlier? Maybe. Typing 'Gary Neville University' into Google (a rare combination of search terms, before this week) throws up a story from 11 October 2016, 'Gary Neville reveals nightclub and university plans', published by Insider Media. 'Gary Neville has revealed plans to open a new nightclub and university next year,' revealed Insider. Speaking to an invited audience at Insider's 42 under 42 event in the Lowry (sponsored by the University of Salford!), we discover that 'you would never associate Gary Neville with nightclubs but I've heard about a London concept in nightclubs that I'm bringing to Manchester. In the next months, I'm also involved in a university for business, media and sport'. Oh yeah?! Unsurprisingly, the story wasn't widely circulated at the time - who would take an idea like that seriously? Ah. ***************************************************** GARY TOWERS The Class of 92’s St. Michael’s development continues to provoke public outrage in Manchester. Despite a major concession by Gary Neville - his twin towers are to be bronze, not black as originally planned - Mancunians are still up in arms because of their obtrusiveness and the destruction of historic buildings that will be involved. It was even highlighted on this morning’s Radio 4 news headlines, with Historic England now joining the fray on the side of the protestors: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-38982505 ***************************************************** A DESIGN FOR LIFE The 'Design the Spine' project continues, and the builders are presently focusing their efforts on the court around the back of the Great Hall. You know, that place with all the footfall, nearby amenities and essential routes to accommodation and lecture theatres. The parts of campus that desperately require attention, such as the actual spine, the covered walkway, and the fenced off mounds of dirt and gravel in which numerous lecture theatres and local businesses are ensconced, remain completely untouched. It's not like the subtext collective is telling its readers anything they don't already know, but would it not make sense to focus on the completion of essential routes first? Or, an even wilder suggestion - could the contractors not have dealt with this during the summer months, which were wasted not developing the new gardens and open spaces, but were wasted doing precisely nothing? The good people at the Lancaster Campus Life Facebook page have tried to generate some enthusiasm for the end result, but given that the vast majority of students won't even be here to enjoy the finished product, it hasn't gone down so well (http://tinyurl.com/grfhckc). ***************************************************** OUTBREAK OF CONSENSUS? It looks as though the New Year has brought about an outbreak of good sense regarding the current Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2020 preparations. Subscribers will be aware that the 'REF health check' or 'research audit' has been causing concern and anxiety in some academic departments (subtext 157). The questions and concerns raised were taken up by Lancaster UCU in conversations with the Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and the Director of HR. More specifically, they summarised them by submitting the following three written questions to them, which are reproduced together with the answers Lancaster UCU received. *** Q1. Members have been unhappy that they are already being asked to nominate and rank possible submissions at such an early stage in the REF cycle. Apart from the stress and anxiety that this has caused, the outputs that colleagues are currently able to submit will bear little relation to what colleagues will actually submit in 4 years' time. Will the university consider postponing these assessments for another two years? A: The university is looking to ensure that this does not cause stress or anxiety and that this work is done in a developmental context. The university does need to start preparing for the next REF now, so that where departments need investment or individuals need advice and support then this can be provided in a timely manner in order to enable the resulting positive effects ahead of the next REF. We are committed to ensuring that any advice to staff is given in a developmental, mentoring framework as the university prepares for the next REF. *** Q2. Members have serious reservations about being required to rank each other's work. In previous exercises in many parts of the university, ranking has been undertaken only by senior professors and external assessors. The requirement to rank and assess each other's work not only creates a considerable extra workload commitment, but can be divisive and undermining of collegiality. Will the university reconsider its request for staff to undertake internal peer review? A: Of course, where we hear of examples of Departments where there are concerns as indicated we will follow up with the Head of Department and Associate Dean (Research) in order to attempt to rectify any concerns. Conversely, where there is good practice (as is the case in most Departments) we will want to share this widely. We are aware that in several Departments the involvement of many staff is being seen positively. *** Q3. Members have expressed concern that results from this research audit could be used by the employer as part of any individual's evaluation in other University procedures. Can you provide reassurance that this won't happen? A: We are able to give UCU and our staff the reassurance that you are seeking. We will not be changing the way in which individual HR staffing matters (e.g. promotion, probation etc.) are dealt with from how they were dealt with prior to this internal output ratings exercise. It is the case that existing and longstanding HR staffing processes often already require judgements on the quality of outputs. This happens routinely in promotion cases for example, but the ratings being used specifically for this REF preparation exercise that is currently being conducted will not be used as the basis for promotion decisions. This internal ratings exercise in preparation for the next REF is entirely separate to promotion or any other HR staffing process. *** Staff who are not members of UCU will not be aware of these reassurances, specifically the reply to question 3 (the assurance that the REF preparations are entirely separate to any HR staffing process which includes promotion, probation, capability or redundancy selection.) It is surely incumbent on HR to circulate this information as widely as possible. Regarding this issue, the subtext collective has been approached by a number of subscribers asking how senior management will be monitoring the actions of those more zealous HoDs. This raises the question of why members of staff should be so mistrustful of what senior management have to say. ***************************************************** PANEL BEATING A recent news item on the staff intranet states that the university is putting together a panel of experts who will be able to consult on Brexit. This seems like a laudable initiative, and may mark a change from the University’s (lack of) strategy so far around Brexit. The idea of drawing on the academic expertise we have to tackle a complex institutional and social issue seems particularly unusual, in these days of outsourcing to consultants who barely seem to know what a University is for (see subtexts passim ad nauseam). Is it possible that University House is slowly being infiltrated by foreign, EU-passport-holding, Brexit-hating secret agents from Brussels? Probably not - but perhaps the message is finally getting through that inaction by the University on this issue will not have desirable consequences! ***************************************************** TRIAL BY TABLE – YEAR THREE For the last two years, subtext has reported on the Spiked Online ‘Free Speech’ rankings, a league table which deems Universities with policies against harassment and bullying in the workplace to be dangerous inhibitors of free speech. Subscribers can read our previous analysis of their methodology in subtext 128, as well as our return to the topic in subtext 141. This year, Lancaster has maintained its position in the ‘Free Speech Rankings’ with a steady ‘Red’ ranking – reached by combining the University’s ‘Amber’ ranking for having a bullying and harassment policy(!) and the Students’ Union’s ‘Red’ ranking for having an equal opportunities policy, a poster code and an external speakers policy. For a project that sets out to report on academic institutions, their methodology would barely scrape a 3rd. The entire campaign is a deliberately arch bit of pettifogging and bleating over the fact that there are structures in place to reprimand them for being horrible to other people, and the only ‘studying’ they conduct is geared towards how nice universities are to minorities. You might say, for example, that the Students’ Union’s gutting of its own accountability structures, historic censorship of the students’ newspaper, and unwillingness to have the deliberations of their decision-making bodies published by journalistic publications make for far more interesting ‘Key Performance Indicators’. Conversely, you might think that a publication like subtext being permitted to exist at Lancaster when it would be trampled into the dirt and fired into the sun by other universities would garner us a better ranking in a better study. It’s a great shame that such a project is driven by this childish ideology, because while the question of whether or not having a stance on bullying and harassment amounts to censorship is subjective, there can be no denying that managerialism, opaque decision-making, and very real cases of academics being fired for whistleblowing and marginalised for speaking out against management constitutes far more interesting data for analysis. ***************************************************** OVERHEARD AT A CAMPUS HOSTELRY 'Excuse me, there are black specks in my lager?' 'Oh it’s coffee. We wash the glasses along with the cups.' ***************************************************** LU TEXT LOST AND FOUND Each issue, we send out our subtext pigeons to return with news stories concerning Lancaster University that somehow doesn’t make it into LU Text’s weekly press roundup. We only have the one this time, and we’re not sure if it’s been mentioned all that much... http://www.dailystar.co.uk/showbiz/587648/Gary-Neville-football-Class-92-private-university Interestingly, it is only in the M.E.N. report that Lancaster is mentioned by name. That this endeavour is already being treated, quite flippantly, as a silly gimmick does not bode well. ***************************************************** NOW UCU, NOW YOU SEE EVEN MORE OF YOU For the first time in a long, long while (probably since the AUT days) Lancaster UCU has a full complement of elected officials. This is obviously good news for UCU members, but also for staff generally and indeed the University as a whole. subtext wishes the new officers, including incoming President Julie Hearn, well. Turnout at the Lancaster UCU AGM was also very good. A packed Marcus Merriman Lecture Theatre heard Jo McNeill from the University of Liverpool talk about the forthcoming national elections for the post of UCU General Secretary, for which she is standing against the incumbent Sally Hunt. She was followed by an annual report from the outgoing President of the branch, Rory Daly. Daly gave a robust and passionate account of the past year’s battles that continue to be to be fought. This honest and reflective account was followed by the Treasurer’s report. Somewhat less articulately, the Treasurer started his report with the announcement that the figures circulated to members at the meeting were ‘nonsense’. The hilarity that greeted this statement turned to gentle bemusement as the Treasurer sought to explain. The fake figure hole that he had created started to get bigger the more he tried to explain the problem. Fake news, perhaps? The hapless soul was rescued by the President announcing that a more coherent set of figures would be presented to the next UCU meeting. A grateful Treasurer returned to his seat mumbling conspiratorial musings about a crack-team of HR or more plausibly Russian hackers attacking his financial files. Thank goodness he didn’t try to show the assembled members his tax returns. The meeting ended with members agreeing to some local rules changes and the heartfelt thanks of the President for their attendance. ***************************************************** THAT’S A RELIEF Sign spotted in the toilet in Lancaster House Hotel: 'FIRE ALARM TESTING. Every Wednesday at 11.00 AM. No need to evacuate' ***************************************************** BE VERY AFRAID The VC is currently doing his round of departmental visits. Nowadays, this is a solo affair, his deputy presumably off perusing his entrepreneur and engagement brief. We’re not sure why they are called departmental visits, because it appears that the same message is delivered to each one he visits. Your correspondent attended one of these recently and was struck by a comparison with Tony Blair and New Labour. In his keynote speech to the Labour Party's 2005 conference in Brighton, the then-Prime Minister Tony Blair said: 'The character of this changing world is indifferent to tradition. Unforgiving of frailty. No respecter of past reputations. It has no custom and practice. It is replete with opportunities, but they only go to those swift to adapt, slow to complain, open, willing and able to change'. Whilst Mr. Blair was celebrating the dynamism of rapid globalisation, the VC’s take on the changing world was to warn us that things are destined to take a nasty turn unless we get with the programme. The VC was keen to thank everyone for us reaching Triple Top 10 for the first time, but then proceeded to tell us of impending threats to our wellbeing. The HE and Research Bill is making its way through Parliament with the aim of delivering increased competition and marketisation in England – we are already seeing the growth of alternative providers; the creation of the Office for Students and UK Research and Innovation; the Teaching Excellence Framework; the Research Excellence Framework; the Government’s Immigration policy; our ‘poor’ showing in the NSS; the lack of teaching qualifications amongst Lancaster staff. And of course Brexit! If we embrace the VC’s proffered solution the future is indeed replete with opportunities, but only to those swift to adapt, slow to complain, open and willing and able to change. ***************************************************** TOPOLOGY CORNER In subtext 156, we reported on how one on-campus business was braving a steep drop in profits due to the mess of the spine refurbishment. We now learn that other, slightly less explainable works on campus are becoming a source of considerable logistical irritation for people working in and around Bowland College. Is anyone able to explain why Bowland Avenue is currently clogged up with traffic cones and inexplicably moved bins? It's taking up an awful lot of parking spaces at a time when parking permits are at a premium and rising in cost every year (some disabled bays are also blocked), as well as scarce due to the constant presence of builders. Not all staff members have the luxury of arriving onto campus at a time when they have the pick of the spaces, nor, it now transpires, have they the luxury of parking near where they work. No explanation for the blockage is clear other than a sign which says 'Road Closed'. We can mystify the matter further - if we're going to be pedantic about it, Bowland Avenue is more of a Cul-de-Sac than a road, since it doesn't lead anywhere... Answers / conjecture to the usual address, please. ***************************************************** THE STUDENT BODY POLITIC And so, we reach mid-Lent term and with the same sense of certainty as death and taxes campus will soon be plastered with the grinning faces of fresh-faced students hoping to spend the next year representing YOU (no, not you; the generic student YOU) as YOUR Students’ Union Full Time Officer (FTO). That’s right: it’s election season for the LUSU President and Vice Presidents. Putting aside the general despair that any mention of an election seems to inspire these days, there are several points for considerations election watchers may want to look out for this year. The first, and by no means the least important point, is where will candidates place their grinning faces now the Spine is increasingly sans pillars? Will they have to go out and talk to the people? Will we see rallies in Alex Square with fired up students chanting to MAKE LANCASTER GREAT AGAIN? More serious points include whether the changes to LUSU’s democratic structures will see an improvement – or a decrease – in the numbers running for student office. If every student who has submitted an idea to LUSU this year, or has at least voted on one, ran, then arguably the move to participation-based politics will reap dividends when it comes to the choice of representatives. But such a possibility seems, at best, unlikely. Who then will run? With the change in structure, LUSU has lost the former FTO training ground that was Union Council. We may expect to see a lot of candidates with college JCR or sports club/society experience running, but the move from representing a single college or sport club/society to the whole of a university’s student population is a big step. Even if this does not impact on numbers, will the lack of experience in the formalised structures of LUSU mean that new FTOs have a steeper learning curve when it comes to working within the University’s far more complex structures? Will candidates be more candid in their manifesto promises, now that they are liable to be scrutinised on them by LUSU’s new, professionally appointment scrutiny panels? And, given the primary reason students are at university is for education – and bearing in mind the old cliché that the day a students’ union stops providing academic representation is the day it should hang-up the ‘closed’ sign on its door – will there be more than one candidate for the unglamorous but singularly important role of Vice President Education? And will, for the first time ever, a woman hold that position? Eagle-eyed election spectators (caveat: who are students) are encouraged to head along to the FTO election hustings at 4pm on Monday 6 March (that’s a whole two subtext issues’ worth of notice), in County South Lecture Theatre. Last year your correspondent got it in the neck for asking the president candidates such complicated questions as their views on TEF – apparently a piece of insider jargon potential student representatives couldn’t possibly be expected to understand - and it would be a pleasant change of pace to have a wave of well-informed questioners asking prospective student representatives some more challenging questions. We would recommend as a starter for ten: 1) Where would any candidate stand on a NSS boycott. (And, for that matter, would they take a stand at all?) 2) If Lancaster does indeed go ahead with the Footballers’ University, how would candidates ensure adequate representation for these associated students? 3) And – for that matter – do candidates feel LUSU’s move towards having greater participatory democracy as opposed to a representative form has strengthened students’ engagement with the union or nullified it? 4) And – FOR THAT MATTER – where do they think the role of an FTO fits into a participatory democratic system? Would candidates envisage a time when FTOs are disposed of altogether in favour of a permanent system of student juries and referendum setting policy? 5) Do candidates feel such a system would be a good one? And if yes, would they be willing to take POLI.101 as part of their training? 6) Do candidates feel that EU students should remain on home student fees following Brexit, and how would they make such recommendations to the University? 7) How would they balance ensuring the best deal for EU students against alienating other International students who pay higher fees? 8) How would candidates balance representing the concerns of part one undergraduate students around teaching against representing the concerns of PGR student tutors? 9) Do candidates feel there is a place for direct action in the body politic of higher education? And if they don’t know what that entails, would they be willing to take POLI.101 as part of their training? 10) WTF does Beyoncé have to do to win Album of the Year? We encourage student readers to write in with further suggestions, but reckon it would be more fun to ask the candidates themselves. More magnanimously, the subtext collective does sincerely wish best of luck to anyone who puts their name down for an FTO role. It is a brave thing to do, but with great electoral power comes great responsibility not to duck important issues. Representing 13,336 students – roughly 20% of an average parliamentary constituency – it is impossible to set out to please every body. Plus constructive disagreement is a sign of healthy democracy. And Lord knows we could do with some of that. ***************************************************** GIG REVIEW Many familiar Lancaster University faces, young and old, were in evidence at the gig at The Priory Hall on Saturday 4th February. The Hall was packed for the Miles Hillbillies, a blues skiffle band who can really cook up a storm. The band consists of guitar, tea-chest bass, harmonica and saw, and a percussion outfit using washboard, kazoo, a rather battered small bass drum and several crumpled cymbals. Despite some sound problems, the band went down very well and by the end of the night quite a number of folk were up and dancing. This was the first time your correspondent has visited The Hall in the evening. It has a family feel during the day but morphs into a hipster joint in the evenings. Some nice wine and a good selection of craft beers on sale – certainly not at student prices! And some fine music. Interestingly, as part of a wider discussion about Atkinsons, the coffee merchants that was founded in Lancaster in 1837, the venue featured recently on Radio 4’s ‘The Food Programme’. The presenter Sheila Dillon was returning to her food roots in Lancashire, meeting people doing and creating extraordinary things in the food industry. As part of this odyssey she met Lancaster alumni Ian and Sue Steel, who are now running the business with their two sons, and have created an enterprise that is growing and thriving. They are enthusiastically guiding that deep history into a new caffeinated future. Good programme, good place and a good band. ***************************************************** LETTERS Dear subtext It was enlightening to read that there is a Hepworth being badly treated on campus. By pure coincidence a similar fate befell a much smaller example just a few miles north in the University of Cumbria. Over ten years I used to traipse the long path from the Keep to the nearest loos in the library (well it keeps one fit) and pass a strange harp like thing stuck between a study room, and a bookshelf. Occasionally bored students would attempt to play it. Only last year was it recognised by a good Yorkshireman as a maquette of 'Winged Figure' which is on the outside wall of John Lewis’ Oxford Street store. It seems it had been moved during library refurb around 2004-5 and quietly ignored. As you can see: http://www.cumbriacrack.com/2016/11/29/barbara-hepworth-sculpture-redisplayed-university-cumbrias-lancaster-campus/ it has now been restored to an improved location in the Library reception, though oddly in this picture it has its back to the entrance so I suspect will have moved if you wish to pay a visit. I’d wonder if it were of a significant value the VC will have it on ebay before you can say 'NHS student funding cuts' Peter Hurst UoC escapee ***************************************************** The editorial collective of subtext currently consists of (in alphabetical order): Paul Arthur, James Groves, Lizzie Houghton, Ian Paylor, Ronnie Rowlands, Joe Thornberry, and Johnny Unger. |