Earlier this month, a report from the Australian National Audit Office found that Australian National University (ANU) leadership approved a $250 million cost-cutting program without clear evidence of its risk, need or impact. The report also found that ANU had manipulated its finances to appear worse in order to justify job cuts.

Guest host Nick Feik is joined by Marija Taflaga, Senior Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations and Director of the Centre for the Study of Australian Politics at ANU, to discuss the corporate governance issues at ANU and Australian universities more widely, and the effects this is having on academics, the student experience, and the culture at universities.

“It is extremely tempting to view this as a story of a few bad apples and personalities, but this is actually structural and systemic – there is essentially a broken governance accountability framework within every Australian university”

Photo credit: supplied.