THE GUARDIAN/ NUS STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE
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Do too many cooks spoil the broth? We test student cookbooks D •:... ,,..---., ......,...,... ....,.,......
~®[3 JOOrBIT~~® Is it really as bad as everyone says it is?
DEPPLY DIPPY The Nick of Time lead is our Star of the Fortnight
CamP.USrents to rise by 2.7 P.er cent B y - -- Joanne Robertson CAMPUS rents will rise by 2.7 per cent across the board next year as part of a new Registry strategy to keep increases in line with Inflation until 2006. Higher occupancy rates and tighter controls on expenditure, including cuts in maintenance, have been cited as giving UEA housing chiefs the scope to slash rent hikes. A room in en-suite campus accommodation for 1996-7 will cost £51.66; Village residents will pay £47.70 whilst standard rooms such as those in Norfolk Terrace are £35.84. Rent for paired ms in Nelson Court and Constable Terrace will be brought into fine with Village rooms equivalent to a five per cent cut. Said Director of Residences and Catering Services, Jenny Grant, "The University's Director of Finance and I were clearly concerned to avoid last year's rent increases. "There was agreement that we would try to keep rents close to inflation. We've got to look at increasing income through higher occupancy and controlling expenditure." She added that rents could have gone up more, but that work will be done to try and increase occupancy levels, which have been targeted at 96.5 per cent for next year. But she felt that attaining the present figure of almost 98.5 per cent would be ·very difficult". Union Finance Officer John Holmes welcomed the proposed rent rises, adding that UEA's commitment to the Hardship Fund would help those who could find campus rents too costly. ·A long term strategy has to be applauded as it gets away from the continual battle of the University taking out its . mismanagement on the next year's residents", he said. He thought the increase was surprisingly low and attributed this to the Rent Strike when 750 students withheld £450,000 of UEA cash in protest at rises of up to 14 per cent. But Jenny Grant dismissed this: "This time, we had to take a long term look and I think that was the right thing to do. We've now got to deliver and that means a lot of hard work, but at least we'll be taking care of students and that's what we're here to do."
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A RADICAL shake-up of campus food outlets has been announced in the wake of a significant restructuring of UniverSity Catering Services.
BREAKERS (pictured above) will be refurbished as part of the proposals. But the last major catering project UEA chiefs announced, a campus fish & chip shop, was axed (top right)
Under the proposals, campus eaterie Breakers will be refurbished and relaunched in the autumn. Registry chiefs are reluctant to reveal exactly what their plans are, but have said that the outlet will no longer be a burger bar and will serve a wider variety of products than at present. · The Diner will also be affected, - - - - B y - - - . . . , receiving structural alterations to Katie Lane enable the construction of four differently-themed ' food halls'. "We also need to cater for internaBut the proposals, part of a strategy to convert recent UCS losses into prof- tional students more effectively and it in the next three years, have resulted we have to look at what happens during shutdown periods." in redundancies and staff reshuffles. But some UEA catering staff are Although UCS currently receives a subsidy of £110,000, the University's furious at the way in which the whole 'Strategic Plan' dictates that the busi- situation has been handled, and claim ness has to break even by the year morale is at im all-time low. "Everybody has bad enough", said 2000. And the provision of a "costeffective catering service to a range of one. "Things would be different if University trading outlets at relevant they had been straight with us from the levels of quality" is high on the list of start. The worst thing about it was that they lied to us." priorities. Yet in March 1994, UEA bosses UEA's Director of Residences and Catering Services, Jenny Grant, high- announced a new development in lighted the main reason for the restruc- catering services, a campus chippy, ture, stating: "The key reason is to only to axe it six months later in change the way in which we provide favour of a canteen facility in the our service to students. It'll help us be Turn to Page 2, col 2 much more responsive.