University of Central Lancashire - Hush money

A university has spent more than £80,000 trying to prevent teaching material from its now-defunct homeopathy courses being released for public scrutiny. After fighting for three and a half years, the University of Central Lancashire agreed in December to hand over the material requested under Freedom of Information laws by David Colquhoun, professor of pharmacology at University College London. Professor Colquhoun then lodged a follow-up FoI request to ascertain the cost to Uclan of its efforts, which included hiring a barrister, to stop the material being released. He was informed, he writes on his blog, that the legal costs alone totalled £80,307. "I'm not convinced that this was a good way to spend taxpayers' money," he said.