Hard-up Scots students stump up whopping £3.8m in library fines

By SHÂN ROSS
Published on Saturday 28 January 2012 02:19

CASH-strapped students in Scotland have paid more than £3.8 million in fines after failing to return library books on time, new figures have revealed.

Edinburgh University topped the league of shame with charges of £592,000 issued from 2007 to January this year.

That included one student who racked up fines of £1,050.

The figures, provided under the Freedom of Information Act, show students at Glasgow’s Strathclyde University were second worst, after running up £576,300 of library fines.

More than 500,000 books were never returned.

Overdue fines have cost some students their degrees and left others having to wait to graduate. At least 1,800 students were told they had to pay off library fines before they could graduate.

The University of the West of Scotland, which has campuses at Ayr, Dumfries, Hamilton and Paisley, said 214 students had not graduated for failing to pay up.

Eben Wilson, director of Taxpayer Scotland, which campaigns for lower taxes, said students should take a more responsible attitude to returning textbooks, at a time when fees have become such a contentious issue.

“Students need to take a bit more care of the money being provided to them by Scottish taxpayers before they ask for more,” she said.

“Racking up thousands of pounds on fines due to their own tardiness isn’t helping themselves or their universities in times of austerity.

“In fact, it’s likely that the money wasted in fines will not be recoverable, and in the end it will be paid by other more disciplined students in lower bursaries and higher costs for their universities.”

Liz Smith, MSP, Scottish Conservative education spokeswoman, added: “The loss of revenue from so many unpaid fines puts into sharp focus how much extra money could be in the system if people acted responsibly.”

“Although library fines are not large they are intended to provide an incentive to return books and borrowers should always be public-spirited and adhere to them.

A spokesman for the University of Edinburgh said: “We feel that our fines are fair and set at a level that encourages students to return books on time for the benefit of all library users. We always send notices to warn students books are overdue prior to charges being incurred.”

The FoI request also revealed Glasgow Caledonian University students racked up £524,000 in fines, while those at Glasgow University face a £496,700 bill.

Aberdeen University collected £482,500, but Robert Gordon University, in the same city, took only £71,545 in fines since 2008.

The National Unions of Students in Scotland declined to comment.

TOME RAIDERS

THE library books most frequently stolen from Scottish universities over the past five years include:

• University of Edinburgh: Positive Teaching in the Primary School by Frank Merret, which was targeted by future teachers.

• University of the West of Scotland: Taxation: Finance Act 2009 by Alan Melville.

• Strategic Management, Awareness and Change, by John Thompson

• Industrial Organisation: competitive, strategy, policy by John Lipczynski.

Comments

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csinclair185

Monday, January 30, 2012 at 01:49 PM

Interesting that this money is seen as "wasted", it is often re-invested in material for student use, not necessarily a bad thing. Our university bowed to pressure from students to introduce fines, previously a points system leading to withdrawal of borrowing rights was used, perhaps more equitably. Income streams at this level suggest that the fine is an inadequate deterrent. Digitising entire texts is not an option on copyright material, Hector, though buying ebooks might be.

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Metalman

Sunday, January 29, 2012 at 11:08 PM

Edinburgh has many more students than Strathclyde, so per capita less costly and many students from outside Scotland. Then, of course, there is all the time and money required to answer FoI requests from journalists on life-or-death matters such as library fines. That has to be paid from the public purse.

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themanwith2brains

Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 10:11 AM

was it only scots who didnt return books,

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freelander

Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 09:56 AM

Why do the universities allow people to keep borrowing books when they have racked up fines already? In the hope that they'll eventually become good citizens? When I was a student you'd have been made to pay before being allowed to take out any more, and any future research would have had to be done in the library itself. The inconvenience made students pay up or confess to having lost the book (which they had to pay for). Hardly an insurmountable problem for an institution full of smart people?

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Navvy

Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 08:47 AM

a book nit returned is a book denied to another student. Such selfish behaviour from people who still believe that they can change the world. let them set their house to rights

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Hector the Lessor

Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 07:36 AM

Well now you have the information of the required reading material, digitise them and offer them as free downloads. Plenty libraries now offer digitised books with I believe a 14 day life. You would need to extend that to cope with the lifespan of the student's course, but not too difficult to achieve. As a matter of non interest, the Gutenberg Press run by one of the Universities in the USA offers classic out of copyright books for download at a voluntary contribution price. I would check them out first before you get too enthusiastic about parting with your cash.

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