2.4
768
the Irvine Committee on Higher Education in the West Indies made detailed recommendations for the endowment of certain basic chairs in the West Indies University College, to protect the College against sudden fluctuations in colonial resources, and that the Asquith Commission on Higher Education in the Colonies, in addition to endorsing these recommendations, advocated an endow- ment policy in general in order to give stability to the finances and staffing of colonial Universities. In view of the special position and purposes of the future University in Hong Kong, we strongly favour the extension of the same principle to Hong Kong and recommend the endowment of the following seven basic chairs: English, Chinese,. Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics, Social Science, and Physiology. This would involve a capital expenditure of £350,000.
RECURRENT EXPENDITURE ON SALARIES.
69. We have taken as a basis of the salary scheme the rates recommended by the Irvine Committee. In the following table of estimates it is assumed that all the posts are filled, that the senior staff are at the maxima of their scales, and that women and men are paid at equal rates. We have assumed that the present practice in relation to the holders of clinical chairs in the Medical Faculty will continue, namely that they will be paid a fixed honorarium in lieu of fees for their consultant practice and that the fees will be paid to the As this is University to be used for the development of the Medical School. to some extent a self-balancing item it has not been included in the table of estimates. We recommend that the University should consider a scheme of marriage and family allowances but, as this would probably be within the maximum salaries suggested, separate provision is not made for it in the table. 70. We endorse the recommendation of the Asquith Commission that a scheme of expatriation allowances for externally recruited staff who retain their domicile in the United Kingdom, and for locally recruited staff when deputed for study or duty in the United Kingdom, should be instituted. Basic rates of pay for all staff would be the same; the differences would arise from eligi- bility for overseas pay or expatriation allowance. In the table the rates shown are not the basic rates but basic rates and full overseas allowances; we con- sider that it is for the University to decide the proportion between basic rates and overseas allowance and make no attempt in the estimate to decide how much of the annual pay of £1,500 for a professor, for example, should be attri- butable to each. It should be noted therefore that the filling of senior posts by locally recruited Chinese would result in a reduction in the following estimates.
45 Lecturers
£
13 Professors
7 Readers
1,500 a year 1,100
£ 19,500
J
7,700
880
"
39,600
19 Junior or Part-time Lecturers
600
"
II,400
38 Tutors and Demonstrators
200
3
7,600
Registrar and Librarian Vice-Chancellor
1,500
23
3,000
2,500
}
2,500
Provident Fund for above at 10 per cent. a year Provident Fund for 7 endowed professors at 10 per cent. a year
£91,300 9,130 1,050
£101,480
£3,000
£104,480
per annum
Clerical staff and servants with superannuation charges at
5 per cent.
(NOTE. If the seven basic chairs were not endowed, the total would be increased by £10, 500 to £114, 980.)
25
RECURRENT EXPENDITURE On DepartmentAL MAINTENANCE, ETC.
169
71. In making an estimate of the annual maintenance expenditure for departments, for scholarships, and for research, etc. (excluding salaries of staff), we have taken into account the pre-war expenditure of the University on such items, the estimates for the University College of the West Indies made by the Irvine Committee, and the special purposes of the proposed University. We recognise that the success of our main proposal depends upon the provision of scholarships to assist students from China proper in numbers sufficient for the realisation of our proposal. A sum of £20,000 is suggested, but in the uncertainty of the future value of Hong Kong and Chinese currencies in relation to sterling, that must be regarded as a token estimate. We judge that the following would be required:— £
72.
Grants to Departments
Grants to Library
Scholarships and Maintenance Grants for students
from China
Research (excluding Fisheries)
Other charges
INCOME.
وو
2,500 per annum 2,000
"
**
20,000 17
7,000 6,000
"
"
*
£37,500
There are three main sources of income which may be presumed to be still available to the University--interest on endowments, grant from the Government of Hong Kong and fees. Before the war, endowments were a diminishing source of revenue. Some had been invested in mortgages in Shanghai and Hong Kong bearing a high rate of interest. The former have to be written off as having been repaid in seriously depreciated Chinese dollars. In 1938 and 1939 the University was able to be rid of a certain number of the Hong Kong mortgages and to invest the capital in British Government securities; the remainder cannot for the present be expected to produce an interest return. The University is left with a sum of about £320,000 in safe investments in the United Kingdom from which it receives an annual return of about £11,500. Of the above capital sum of £320,000 the sum £260,000 represents a gift from the British Government out of its share of the Chinese Boxer Indemnity, and the interest on this is at free disposal for University purposes. A part of the remainder was given by the Rockefeller Foundation and the interest is earmarked for part payment of the salaries of professors of Medicine, Surgery and Gynecology.
The Government of Hong Kong made an annual grant to the general fund of the University, maintained a certain number of scholars and con- tributed to the support of students in training to become teachers. The total payment from this source was about £23,500 per annum.
The fee income of the University had risen before the war to about £22,000 per annum.
The total income that might be available to the University from these three sources is therefore about £57,000 per annum.
* In 1940 the Boxer Indemnity Trust Financed Scholarships awarded by the Sino- British Cultural Association for study in Hong Kong, HK$ 1350 (£90) was allowed for fees and living costs, HK$ 225 (£15) for books and an average of about HK$ 600 (£37 10s.) The amount for travel between China and Hong Kong in two vacations during the year.
of our estimate at these rates would provide for about 140 scholars in all, including graduates. We are of the opinion that the University should have wide discretion as to the amounts paid and the length of tenure of scholarships.