It’s not the first and it certainly won’t be the last. The rector of the University of Bari, Stefano Bronzini, has announced that he wants to increase his salary. After the green light from the Board of Directors, he formally asked the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) for an increase of 128% to bring his gross annual compensation from 71 thousand to 160 thousand euros, also with retroactive effect for 2022. move that follows that of his colleague from the Polytechnic of Bari, who last December had asked the Mef for a quadruple increase in his salary, sparking fierce controversy. The rector of the University of Lecce had also attempted a similar request, but then chose to renounce it following the unfavorable opinion of the academic Senate. The decision on the increase in Bronzini’s compensation is now up to the Mef, which will have to evaluate whether the economic and financial conditions of the university can really guarantee a maneuver of this type in safety. But where does this race to increase one’s compensation as rector originate?
The Draghi government decree
The rectors’ request is completely legitimate, since it refers to the provisions of decree 143 of 23 August 2022, issued by the then Draghi government. The Prime Ministerial Decree regulated the remuneration, attendance fees and any other form of remuneration due to members of the administrative and control bodies, both ordinary and extraordinary, of public bodies. The increase in the allowance is determined by four objective criteria established by the decree: net worth, active assets, product value and personnel expenditure. In the case of universities, it translates – for example – into the fact that the size of the university directly influences the reference parameter. The larger the structure, the greater the increase in salary. However, as he explains to Open the trade unionist of the Flc Cgil Luca Scacchi, «it is a possibility and not an obligation».
The other universities and the rectors’ version: «Many responsibilities»
The request for salary increases by rectors is now spreading like wildfire and, in fact, involves several universities as in the case of Urbino, Cagliari and Macerata. But not only. In the first case, the rector doubled his salary, bringing it to 121 thousand euros gross. An increase that he justified by arguing that universities, “now considered companies”, must adapt compensation to growing responsibilities, and that the budget is able to support these costs. The same motivation was also given, moreover, by Bronzini of the University of Bari, according to whom these are figures that adapt “to the increase in responsibilities” incumbent on rectors. «I – he declares – put my signature on several million euros, I have a responsibility that extends to all the staff, around 3 thousand people, to 42 thousand students, to 700 thousand square meters of structures, of which 600 thousand are covered, to contracts. In short, an enormous complexity.” The Sardinian front, however, went more quietly to the ears of the media. But, again in January, the rector of the University of Cagliari, Francesco Mola – in office since 2021 – also raised his salary from 60 thousand to 132 thousand euros. Meanwhile, last month, the rector of the University of Macerata, John Mc Court, asked the MEF to have his allowance go from around 60 thousand euros to just over 111 thousand euros gross per year.
The fury of the unions: “They already receive a double salary”
This trend of salary increases among rectors, however, makes the unions turn up their noses. «We find it inappropriate and it leaves us amazed. We are in a season in which the salaries of public employees are blocked at the 2019 contract renewal and the effects of real inflation cannot be covered”, is the vision of trade unionist Scacchi. Who is keen to highlight a peculiarity of the position of rectors compared to other public managers: «The rector does not go on leave. He does not stop being a university teacher, at most he can have a reduction in his teaching loads, but he is never a total suspension of teaching. Consequently, he maintains his salary as a teacher in addition to that of the rector. And, once the role of rector is finished, he returns to being a teacher.”
The letter to the government fell on deaf ears
Therefore, each rector receives, on the one hand, the salary as a teacher and, on the other, an allowance for the elective position held. The law establishes a maximum ceiling of 240 thousand euros that they can receive in total. In recent months, the Gilda-Unams union has raised doubts and concerns in this regard, sending a letter to the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of University and Research, the Mef, the Court of Auditors and the Conference of University Rectors Italian. In the letter, in addition to criticizing the maxi-increases, calling them “abnormal increases harmful to public finances”, the union asked the institutions to ascertain that “the increases in the rectors’ allowances, to which are added the salary of full professor and the other increases to be borne by public finances do not exceed, as would actually appear, the limit of 240 thousand euros established by current regulations”. At the moment, however, there has still been no public response to these concerns, and more and more rectors are calling for increases in their compensation.
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