Professor Colin Hughes is the Associate Vice President for Sustainability at the University of Manchester (see our November 2012 interview with him).  We contacted him last night for a statement about the University’s marked slippage in the latest People and Planet league table.

“Our strategies, plans, structures and processes are focused on realising the University’s strategic aims and don’t necessarily map on to, conform or comply with People and Planet’s Green League assessment criteria. Indeed, a number of our aspirational environmental sustainability initiatives fall outside their rating scheme. Like all top flight research intensive universities we have areas that we need to improve, and towards that end our detailed environmental strategy, planning and performance documents are available online so that everybody can judge our credibility and performance.”