Treasurer’s Report

Happily, we have seen the impact of Covid recede significantly this year. We have still had some of our students and staff reporting positive tests but the more relaxed rules about selfisolation and the success of the vaccination programme have meant that the disruption to college life has been much less significant. For the most part we have returned to in-person teaching and we have been able to restore our weekly guest nights during term time, which have proved more popular than ever – not least because our new kitchen facilities have allowed our catering staff to excel themselves!

Financially, our conference income has begun to recover and this year will be about two-thirds of pre-pandemic levels. Our shop rents are beginning to return to normal, although there are still some significant arrears to be managed with our smaller tenants. In broad terms we expect to break even this year, with the impact of the reduced income and inflationary cost pressures in recent months being offset by a very strong year with unrestricted donations.

We haven’t yet had any year-end valuations, but early indications are that our endowment may have lost a little value compared to last year which, if confirmed, would be a good result given all the uncertainty about rising inflation and the economic outlook.

Work over the summer includes fitting acoustic panels to the Dining Hall ceiling, which we very much hope will make eating in Hall less of an assault on the ears, and we have almost completed the refurbishment of the two flats above 26 and 27 Little Clarendon Street – the property that we bought last year. We are also increasingly turning our attention to what we need to do to our buildings in forthcoming years to help with the move to being carbon neutral.

Finally, we heard last month that the Catherine Hughes Building has won a RIBA award for the South of England, which we think reflects both the quality of the design and the construction.

ANDREW PARKER, COLLEGE TREASURER

Looking forward, we expect our finances to come under some pressure. The impact of rising inflation, especially in utilities, will feed through to our costs very quickly but our income will not rise in the same way – partly because UK tuition fees are frozen but also because we want to be as supportive as we can be with our students in setting rent and food prices for next year.

ANDREW PARKER