Exclusive:Disgraced Dundee University head urged to reconsider after failing to hand back £150k payout

Professor Iain Gillespie told a meeting of Holyrood’s education committee in June he would “reflect” on whether or not to keep the six-figure settlement.

However, Mr Gillespie has not repaid any of money to the institution he was forced to leave after revealing a £35 million financial deficit and the risk of hundreds of job losses.

Now the ex-principal has been urged to make good on his promise of “reflection” - and pay back the money.

Douglas Ross, the MSP who chairs the education committee, said it was clear Mr Gillespie does not “deserve” the payoff.

The Scottish Tory politician said: “When we heard from Professor Gillespie in June several members of the Committee asked whether he would pay back the £150,000 pay-off he received.

“In one session he went from saying he hadn’t considered handing the money back, to saying he would consider it.

“It seems however he never really planned to give this money back.”

The academic had told the committee that it was not “cowardice” that saw him walk away from Dundee University but rather he felt “responsible” as the accountable officer.

Following the string of failings uncovered at the university under his leadership, Mr Gillespie was asked by Mr Ross whether he was “incompetent or corrupt” and chose “incompetent”.

He told MSPs: “I'm certainly not corrupt, so I'll have to choose incompetent."

Mr Ross added: “Professor Gillespie accepted at committee that he had been incompetent while in charge of this great university.

“You would hope that alone would have been enough to convince him that he did not deserve this payoff.

“Given the ongoing uncertainty around redundancies at the University of Dundee, I still hope – even at this late stage - Professor Gillespie is able to come to a sensible conclusion and return his pay-off.”

Mr Gillespie did not respond to a request for comment, however a university insider said it was understood that “no monies have been returned to the university as yet”.

The Gillies report, commissioned to look at the situation at Dundee, cited poor financial judgement from university management and highlighted 12 occasions where Mr Gillespie “should have and could have” known about the severity of problems at the university.

The principal’s replacement, Professor Shane O’Neill, resigned following the report’s publication, as did the acting chair of court Tricia Bey.

Mr Gillespie had told the committee the report was "extremely painful for all of us, it's extremely painful to read, extremely painful to reflect, extremely painful to learn the level of our failure."

A recovery plan for the university was this week rejected by the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), which said it had written to Dundee to “outline a different direction”.

The proposal included plans to cut 400 additional jobs on top of 300 voluntary redundancies already proposed.

This included a further 220 voluntary redundancies and 170 compulsory redundancies.