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Volume 7 | Issue 2 Monday 15 October 2012 thefounder.co.uk
the independent student newspaper of royal holloway, university of london
Professor Frank Discrimination Case Dismissed By Tribunal Thomas Seal Editor
T
he case determining the fairness of the college’s treatment of Royal Holloway Professor of Economics, Jefferson Frank, has been dismissed by the Reading Employment Tribunal. The dispute arose when Prof Frank, who founded RHUL’s Economics department and has served as its head, claimed that despite his eighteen years of service to the university, he was receiving an unfair payscale band of 2+, and had not received a pay rise for six years.
This follows the gender tribunal of Professor Liz Schafer in 201011, another high-profile case of a RHUL professor protesting pay inequality. Prof Schafer claimed RHUL’s system ‘rewarded discontent and punished loyalty,’ in its responding to professors’ threatening to leave with retention payments. That tribunal concluded that RHUL’s professorial pay band system is ‘open to question’, instituted changes, and increased Prof Schafer’s salary by £10,000, so Prof Frank certainly had precedent for his case. Professor Frank attributed this
unfair treatment either to a prejudicial reaction his sexuality - he is gay - or to a latent reaction to when he sued the college two years ago on the grounds of discrimination regarding both his sexuality and being member of a trade union. That case was settled out of court, but Prof Frank’s sense of grievance was not. His coverage in the Daily Mail included some of his objections: ‘I was perhaps the only professor at the college who had been invited to be visiting professor at the most continued on page 2
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