This will be the first time that the RUG Board will offer insight into their expenditures of their own accord. The receipts will give a detailed overview of the trips which board members take, the hotels where they stay and the gifts that they buy for business partners.
The university is following in the footsteps of the universities of Maastricht and Utrecht. The University of Maastricht decided to publish their receipts seven years ago after a journalist filed a request under the Dutch Government Information Act (WOB) to view the receipts. Utrecht chose to share their receipts last year after De Telegraaf conducted an investigation into the expenses made by the board members.
The RUG Board of Directors’ expenses were previously made public when RTL filed a WOB request for the expenses of all Dutch universities and published a story with their findings. The story revealed that back in 2014, rector magnificus Elmer Sterken wanted to write off his partner’s breakfast costs when she was on a trip with him in New York. An internal supervisor blocked that request.
All universities
According to RUG spokesperson Jorien Bakker, the first receipts will likely be published over the course of this year. Bakker says that all universities are planning to publish their expenses online. They are currently in the process of making deals with the universities to that end.
‘The Board of Directors is still deciding whether or not they will participate in this initiative or if they will come up with their own way to share that information on the website’, she says.