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. . . . . . . . . "Pathologies" and destruction of evidence The two versions of the Corner/Esler report The vice chancellor's behaviour |
Are the Scottish Employment Tribunals and
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Tristan Platt was branded 'mad as a hatter' by (now Professor) Peter Clark at an employment tribunal in Edinburgh. In fact Mr Platt was not mad at all: he simply had a strategy of being persistently uncooperative and hostile towards his immediate colleagues in the University of St Andrews in order to escape from doing as much work as he could get away with. This strategy led to deep and bitter divisions within his department and proved to be the catalyst for much of what unfolded and is related here. The University management produced a report into the Department, which they characterise in terms of its 'pathologies'. In fact the fundamental pathology was that the contribution of the professors in the Department was so woeful that the Department was a complete mess. Ironically, the author resisted attempts to scapegoat Platt for the Department's pitiful condition, but was then scapegoated himself for being a whistleblower. He eventually resigned and brought a case against the University at an employment tribunal. Another member of staff—Dr David Riches, who had been a paragon of conscientiousness and collegiality—bore the brunt of much of the unpleasantness and eventually was forced to take early retirement on grounds of extreme ill health. The departmental secretary also resigned in disgust...
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Joanna Overing was one of the two professors at the time of the University management's investigation into the shenanigans in the Department of Social Anthropology. When forced—against her will—to appear as a witness at an employment tribunal, she curiously turned up with a barrister to 'mind' her, as if she was a party to the dispute. She then suffered a quite incredible loss of memory about the events which led to her being 'sacked' as head of department by the University's administration.
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Nigel Rapport was the other professor at the time of the University management's investigation into the Department of Social Anthropology. The author of this website has published a number of articles stating that Rapport's work brings the discipline into disrepute because he confuses self-indulgent writing about himself with genuine anthropology, which seeks to explain what makes human beings distinctive. See, for example: 2000, Social Anthropology and 'Rapportage': Is 'All of Human Life' in Britain? Anthropology Today 16(3): 19-20. Pissed off with the author's criticisms of him, Rapport wrote to the Principal of the University demanding that the author be made to withdraw certain criticisms he had made in an internal forum. The Principal agreed to do this and wrote to the author three times requiring him to withdraw certain criticisms he had made of Rapport. The author refused on the grounds that a university is a place where you are supposed to defend academic integrity and freedom, not trample on it, and the Principal then embarked on a rather squalid course of action which is detailed at The "abusive and humiliating" behaviour of [the Principal].
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Roy Dilley refused to give evidence to an employment tribunal because he was afraid of the consequences. The University of St Andrews subsequently promoted him to a readership and then to a professorship. At an earlier internal university meeting Mr Dilley also refused to say anything about intolerable behaviour he had complained about bitterly (and with a certain amount of bravado sabre-rattling) for years - see The most disgraceful meeting... Had Mr Dilley spoken up at that meeting things might have turned out very differently. The subsequent degradation of the university by Dilley's 'superiors' and those they chose to represent them depended on the silence of Dilley and certain others. Our universities are now in the perilous state they are in because so many academics are colluding, overtly or covertly, with bullying managers whose objectives have nothing whatsoever to do with the aims of academic inquiry.
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Peter Clark lied to an employment tribunal concerning a surreptitious offer he put to the author on the University's behalf. He told the author that the University would pay him seven months' salary if he left the University. There was corroborating evidence regarding this from another witness. In the tribunal, Mr Clark denied having said what he had indeed said. The University of St Andrews subsequently promoted him to a professorship.
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John Skorupski is fairly typical of a certain breed of managerial professors in universities these days. Like many academics in provincial universities such as St Andrews, he would much rather be somewhere more distinguished but has not managed to achieve this and has been stuck with the consequences. To see why he has the dubious honour of having this website named after him, go here.
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Brian Lang is the Principal of the University of St Andrews. Mr Lang was accused at an employment tribunal of thuggish bullying, concealment of evidence, and suppression of academic freedom. More information can be found at The "abusive and humiliating" behaviour of [Mr Lang].
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Ian Truscott was the barrister who represented the University of St Andrews at an employment tribunal and subsequent appeal hearing. A QC, he was paid very large sums of the University's money and used every trick at his disposal to present a tissue of misrepresentations and to delay proceedings. Is such behavior not gross contempt of court? Conveniently for Mr Truscott, his behaviour was very substantially aided by both the Chairman of the Tribunal and the judge presiding over the appeal into the tribunal's decision.
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Mark Sischy was the Chairman of the tribunal. Disgracefully, the tribunal hearings were spread out over a year and the judgment took a further eight months to produce. When it appeared, all but a single comment from the evidence of the appellant's witnesses had simply disappeared from the record. Mr Sischy was subsequently relieved of his duties because of alcohol problems. There is very good reason to doubt that he wrote the judgment. There is no doubt that he cynically perverted the course of justice by concealing evidence that went to the heart of the case. Whether he did this directly, or indirectly—by signing a judgment he had not himself written, has never been clarified.
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Anne Smith is otherwise known as The "Honourable" Lady Smith and presided over the appeal into Mr Sischy's judgment. At a preliminary hearing of the Employment Appeals tribunal (EAT) she ordered that a transcript of the evidence of the appellant's main witness be produced. When the appellant's barrister attempted to show that the main points of that evidcnce had simply been buried by Mr Sischy, she was prevented from proceeding by the "Honourable" lady and thus from presenting the single most important plank of the appeal. Apparently the "Honourable" Lady Smith did not think it appropriate to tell the appellant's barrister that Mr Sischy had been removed from his post at a critical time in relation to the appellant's judgment. Not surprisingly, she dismissed the appeal that she had so signally curtailed. There is no doubt that certain figures in the EAT were aware of Mr Sischy's perversion of the course of justice and cynically covered it up, presumably to protect both an errant tribunal chairman and the 'royal' university. The EAT was thus guilty of a further perversion of the course of justice.
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Is this how universities protect their reputation these days? |
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"The more vain one's ambition, the more redundant one's grasp of morality" |
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