Report by Paul Jarvis and Sarah Chadwick in The Oxford Student, 21st November 2002
"SHEER POLITICAL CHEEK" was how Anthony Smith, the President of Magdalen, last week described proposed changes to the college auditing system.
The government document, entitled "Private Action, Public Benefit", is aimed at reforming the Charity Commission, and it means that colleges could be forced to present their accounts to the Commission, something from which universities and colleges, unlike most charities, are currently exempt. Universities, but not colleges, currently present their accounts to the higher education funding councils. Smith, also Vice-President of the University's development programme, was quoted in The Times criticising the plans, describing them as a "threat to academic autonomy."
However, speaking to the Oxford Student, Mr Smith played down his opposition, saying, he "simply expressed the fear that the new arrangements would impose another layer of bureaucracy," pointing out that college accounts are already audited. He also admitted that he was not qualified to speak authoritatively about the document, and that his views were just first impressions.
The proposals were praised by philanthropy experts in America, with Harvey Dale, director of the National Center on Philanthropy and the Law at New York University saying, "I wish we had something like it in the States".