29 March 2017 
Matt Sisson, Projects and Membership Manager
Finances in the English HE sector are strong overall, but with significant variation between institutions, according to HEFCE’s 2015-16 Financial Health of the HE sector report. It is a similar story to last year then, but with the added complication of the introduction of FRS102 amplifying some of the figures, and with perhaps a slightly higher level of concern that the fortunes of some sector institutions are diverging.
The overall sector surplus was £1.5bn, but at an institutional level results ranged from a 7.2% deficit to a 32.1% surplus. Cash flow increased from 9.2% if income in 2014-15 to 10.3% in 2015-16, while unrestricted reserves fell 4% to £23.9bn. The data also show that, excluding last year’s one-off boost from RDEC, like-for-like research income increased 6.1%, or by £272million.
There’s little in the headline figures to cause widespread concern, however the report notes that “Forecast data from July 2016 shows that the sector is projecting a significant rise in overseas income, to reach £4.8 billion by 2018-19”, and that “…increasing competition from other countries and proposed changes to student immigration rules suggest these projections may be difficult to achieve.”
The summary on the HEFCE website is here, with limited coverage on the Times Higher here. The other common news outlets appeared not to wish to grasp the FRS102 bramble – or maybe they just had other stories to occupy them, coming as it did the day after the Westminster attack, and in the middle of Article 50 week.
