Plans & Prospects 2023

Financial Report
College Bursar Richard Morin reflects on Wolfson’s achievements in a challenging financial year, and looks ahead to some of the
exciting developments being made possible by the generosity of alumni and friends.
This has been another challenging year
for the College finances as inflation has
continued to spiral and the increase
in the cost of borrowing has brought
about the inevitable write down of
investment values. Nevertheless, the
underlying health of the College finances,
along with our prudent and cautious
approach, has enabled us to just about
balance the books once again. Thanks
to the kindness of alumni and others
we have continued our decarbonisation
programme and have managed to
establish a new, permanently endowed
research fellowship in memory of Sir
Isaiah Berlin. This endowed fellowship
has been created from the amalgamation
of small donations received for this
purpose over many years, and shows
that even the smallest of donations can
grow into something substantial and
important over time.
The adjustment in asset prices because
of the increase in the cost of borrowing
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has resulted in a substantial fall in the
value of our investments, with both
public and private equity, as well as
property, being challenged by the
changing landscape. A predicted sharp
drop in inflation has yet to happen, but
it is still generally believed that inflation
will diminish by the end of this calendar
year (as a result of lapping itself if for
no other reason), and, of course, this
assumes no other major catastrophes
befall the economy.
One of the saddest impacts of the
current cost of borrowing is that we are
no longer able to raise the £14 million
that we had hoped to raise through
the private markets to fund a new
‘Garden Building’ to accomodate 50 new
student rooms on our south car park.
The design has now been completed
and planning permission achieved, and,
originally, we had intended to borrow
the money and service the debt through
the income that the new rooms would
have generated. The rise in the cost
of interest rates unfortunately means
that this is no longer possible, and we
are therefore looking at other options,
including fundraising, to fund the finance
gap. It would be terrific to be able to
complete this important project, as it
would enable another 50 students to
live on site and be immersed in the full
Wolfson experience.
We have also been working on
completing the design for a new sports
and wellbeing centre, and we hope to
submit this for planning permission in
the coming months. This work has been
instigated and supported by the kindness
of a generous donor, to whom the
College will be eternally grateful. While
full funding is not yet in place for the
building phase, we are hopeful that more
funds can be raised and construction can
start as soon as finances allow.
With the value of our investments