Edinburgh University has paid hundreds of thousands to its vice chancellor and principal, despite financial ‘blackholes’ and proposed job cuts for staff.

The Daily Record has revealed that they paid out £881,789 to Sir Peter Mathieson for pay and expenses over a two year period. The splurge comes despite Edinburgh University staff facing redundancies as part of plans to save £140million.

Meanwhile, the University of the West of Scotland has paid principal Prof James Miller £539,429 in pay and expenses, including £5970 for a luxury junket to Barbados. The UWS has a £14.4million deficit.

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Last night, politicians criticised the eye-watering spending. Scottish Conservative shadow education secretary Miles Briggs MSP said: “It’s shocking senior staff at Scottish universities are living it up while a number of institutions face financial black holes.

“Staff across the sector are looking down the barrel of unemployment, while those at the top splash the cash on fancy foreign junkets and luxury accommodation. Scotland’s universities are at the brink of collapse after years of SNP underfunding. It’s time ministers reined in the waste and delivered the support our institutions desperately need.”

Scottish Labour education spokesperson Pam Duncan-Glancy MSP added: “Our universities are the pride of Scotland and it’s important that every penny is spent wisely.

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“The Scottish Government should be supporting our universities so that they remain enviable institutions for years to come.”

We revealed how University of Edinburgh’s Sir Mathieson – who claims not to know his own £421,667 salary, which rose from £417,666 the previous year – cost the university £42,456 for foreign travel between 2022 and 2024. Prof Mathieson racked up the expenditure on business class flights to South Africa, South Korea, the US and Hong Kong, among others, between March 2022 and May last year.

Our investigation uncovered £3059 spent on accommodation and £1336 on transport in Milan, London, Texas, Brussels, Warsaw and Hong Kong from September 2023 to last July. In 2018, Prof Mathieson was also given a £26,000 relocation budget to move from Hong Kong University where he was vice-chancellor.

We told how Prof Mathieson, who owns a luxury apartment in Wimbledon, lives rent-free in a £1.7million Regent Terrace grace and favour townhouse in Edinburgh. Prof Miller, who joined the uni in November 2022, received a proportion of his salary and emoluments equating to that year £214,000.

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We previously told how UWS’s Prof Miller, 61, who earns £288,000 a year, including pension contributions, claimed £37,429 in expenses over the term. An Edinburgh University spokes-woman said: “The salary of the Principal…is determined by a Remuneration Committee. The property provided as part of the role was donated to the University in 2015 and it is maintained accordingly.

“Every international visit and associated expense is tied to strategic projects and partnerships, many of which are the result of years of work by our academic and professional staff.”

A UWS spokesman said: “Principals at universities in Scotland are not responsible for setting salaries, that is decided by remuneration committees. Pension contributions are as a result of decisions taken by pension providers.

“International travel for business is not funded through public money but through the income generated from international recruitment and partnership activities.”