User talk:Mancuniandr

Alan Gilbert
Welcome to Wikipedia!

I notice you keep adding text such as
 * "His genius for creating financial disasters has been further confirmed during his reign at Manchester"

to Alan Gilbert. Please take a look at Wikipedia's Neutral Point of View policy WP:NPOV. We need encyclopedia articles to be verifiable, neutral, notable and encyclopedic in tone. There are lots of discussion forums for discussing your opinions about Gilbert's financial acumen (!), but this is not one of them. I think we get away, just with saying "The venture was a financial disaster and was widely criticized by academics, politicians and the media." because there are lots of sources that support that view in the case of MUP, and no one saying it was anything but a disaster. If you find some one important saying something like the sentiment you express about UoM (eg a Union leader quoted in a newspaper) then it might be appropriate to quote that in the article. In my own opinion it requires much more careful analysis to go beyond the attention grabbing headlines. For example a budget deficit of 5% of the University's turnover was not a cause for such drastic action to reduce the debt, and the ERVS scheme was badly implemented. But to include that in an encyclopedia article we would have to quote that as being a point of view expressed by some notable authority in a way that was verifiable.

Please don't be put of future contributions to Wikipedia, and please ask (eg on my or others talk page) if you need help. Billlion (talk) 08:51, 5 May 2008 (UTC)