Jane Hutton's suspension followed shortly after an email she wrote to me, the JNC chair, and one of UUK's negotiators. The reaction this email received from #USS CEO Bill Galvin makes me believe he considered it a breach of her responsibilities. 1/
My guess is that this email formed part of the case that #USS assembled against Jane and resulted in her being fired on Friday. This is only guesswork, as the report is kept in a locked room and has not (and will not) be published. So what was in Jane's email? 2/
Jane's email, sent on 13 May, contains three occurrences of problems in board papers intended to inform decisions on the valuation. She said that she considered it her fiduciary duty to inform the JNC of these matters, and told the board she was doing so. 3/
Her email was followed later the same day by one from #USS CEO Bill Galvin to the same recipients attempting to correct what he claimed were "misunderstandings" in Jane's email and making it clear that her email was not a formal communication from the board. 4/
So what were the concerns that Jane felt it her duty to inform the JNC over? The first was the inability of the #USS executive to provide evidence to support statements attributed to the Pensions Regulator in board (and JNC) documents. 5/
The second was over a paper to the board on trigger contributions which contained "odd results": the effect on the volatility of the self-sufficiency deficit by taking a 40-day rolling average had been significantly overstated according to the underlying data, she claimed. 6/
The third concern was over modelling done by USS for the JNC on year 20 projections, where (a) a 20% contribution rate had been used, and (b) conclusions had been drawn over the figures at the 99th-centile despite too few trials having been used to make them robust. 7/
We now know that the first concern was well grounded: an email from @TPRgovuk to Galvin and Eastwood (#USS chair) had already complained of a misrepresentation in the documents, but it had been withheld from the board (see @JosephineCumbo ft.com/content/3b6a2f…). 8/
The second concern seems to come down to whether one measures the volatility of the daily differences or of the overall dataset, and which one is more relevant to the context. It is likely Jane's point is well made, but I have not seen the papers referred to. 9/
On the third concern, I have seen the paper, and the conclusions drawn from modelling (& stated authoritatively) didn't take into account statistical uncertainty: in fact, the uncertainty in the figures quoted was wider than the gap between them. #USS now concede this point. 10/
I replied to Bill Galvin as below. Note that the "new measure" proposed by #USS did nothing to improve the robustness of their claims, something which they also had to backtrack on. 11/ 
What I have seen in my time on the JNC (of which Jane's email is only one part) leads me to have serious doubts over the integrity and/or competence of those running the scheme. Worse, @UniversitiesUK know all this and keep quiet. 12/
I plan to write to @frankfieldteam of the @CommonsWorkPen and @TPRgovuk to express my concerns and ask them to intervene. We cannot let the way this scheme is being run lead yet again to major industrial unrest in the sector. Something needs to give, and fast. 13/
And as for Jane Hutton? Her reputation is being trashed by an organisation that will not countenance scrutiny or diversity of opinion, and whose default response to criticism is to counter-attack and cover-up. Please sign & share the petition below. 14/14 change.org/p/uss-members-…
