Headteacher spent £150,000 of struggling school’s money on designer headphones and Michelin star meal

A headteacher was allowed to spend £150,000 of a struggling school’s money, including on a pair of designer headphones and a Michelin star meal.

Stella Mbubaegbu, the principal of Highbury College in Portsmouth, travelled in luxury “executive chauffeur” driven cars including a Cadillac, and took first class flights to stay at five-star hotels around the world, it has emerged.

Over the past five years, she spent over £60,500 on accommodation, over £72,800 on travel and a further £2,300 on food and drink, according to corporate credit card receipts obtained under Freedom of Information (FOI) laws by the magazine FE Week.

Ministers have ordered a review into the school’s spending, saying they are “deeply concerned” by the revelations.

Earlier this year, Highbury College announced plans to close its sixthform amid deteriorating finances. Minutes from a governors’ meeting reveal that Ms Mbubaegbu warned the 2019/20 budget would be the “hardest for many years”, adding that “there was a very limited safety net if cash ran out”.

Such were the financial pressures that the chair of governors, Tim Mason, said he “wished to explore” merging with the neighbouring Portsmouth College.

Ms Mbubaegbu, who was awarded a CBE in the 2008 New Year Honours for services to further education, denied being a “flagrant spend-thrift” who uses College funds for "personal gain”.

Her purchases included £434.86 Bang & Olufsen Beoplay H8 headphones and a meal at the Michaelin starred restaurant Quilon in London for herself and three other guests for £356. Receipts from the principal’s travels also show taxi rides including the use of “executive chauffeurs”.

One shows that after landing in London Heathrow,  she paid £175 for a taxi take her to the Hilton Birmingham Metropole hotel, while another taxi picked up her luggage and took it back to her home address in Hampshire.

Between 2013/14 and 2017/18, Ms Mbubaegbu stayed at dozens of four or five star hotels in America, Canada, Germany, South Africa, Dubai, China and Saudi Arabia, as well as four separate nights at the Portsmouth Marriott Hotel which is a 20 minute drive from her home address.

Ms Mbubaegbu said: “The sole purpose for my international work has always been with the aim of increasing the College’s reputation overseas in order to create additional sources of income.

“Over the last four years the College has earned in the region of £2.5 million pounds of additional income from international business development activities, income that has been vital in protecting both student services and the quality of education afforded to our students in a time of significant and unprecedented cuts to Government sponsored programmes.

“In its entirety, the expenditure incurred furthered the operational and strategic goals of the College.”

She added that all the expenses that were released under FOI laws were “approved and authorised correctly and are also subject to independent audit in accordance with College procedures”.

The College, which was previously had an “outstanding” rating, was last year downgraded to “requires improvement” by Ofsted. Inspectors noted that “leaders and governors have been slow to reverse the college’s decline in performance.”

Lord Agnew, the schools minister, said: “I have already asked the FE Commissioner to urgently look into this matter.

“School and college leaders must treat taxpayers’ money with the utmost care and in a way that benefits their students. Where this does not happen we take the strongest possible action.”

He added that the college’s attempts to block the publication of the credit card records were “shocking”, and that he welcomed the Information Commissioner’s ruling that it must release the receipts.