This is a unique insight into the working life of a senior manager in academia. Centring on events in one Scottish educational institution, the stories expand to cover events affecting higher education across the whole of Britain. This intimate history of one college serves to reveal some of the dark secrets of everyday life in higher education, including¢ the demographic time-bomb that wasn't ¢ political chicanery ¢ North Sea safety and the Piper Alpha tragedy ¢ skulduggery and brilliance ¢ sabotage and intrigue ¢ media machinations ¢ quashing the quangos ¢ educational vandalism ¢ academia's bloodied carpets ¢ the denigration of public service ¢ Quality - the undemocratic essence at the heart of Britain's Establishment It describes behaviour - good and bad - and its consequences, with understanding and compassion, and not without a little touch of irony.
