Stakeholders must by Friday send responses to controversial legislation that would dramatically reconfigure the governance of higher education institutions, after Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris launched a consultation process on February 19th.
The new legislation would majorly increase the control the government has over governing bodies in universities, and is set to go to cabinet by the end of March.
A document outlining the legislation by the government stated that the Higher Education Act (HEA) will first allow the university to fix any issues that arise. However, if the HEA decides that the issue “has not been resolved to the satisfaction of the HEA that action will be taken”.
In serious situations, this action can include the “dissolution and reconstitution” of the governing authority of the university.
Such actions also include the the appointment of a person or body “to provide assistance or providing guidance”, the imposition of a “rectification plan”, the “controlled release of funding”, the “withholding of funding” and “exclusion from particular categories of grants”.
The legislation also proposes reducing the size of governing authorities to 12 members, consisting of an independent chair, the chief officer, four external members, two students and no more than four members of academic staff, non-academic staff and ex-officio members.
This change would majorly sway the College Board’s make up in favour of external members appointed by the government.
A confidential memo brought to the last meeting of College Board – seen by The University Times – stated that the heads of Ireland’s universities and the governing authority chairperson attended a briefing session with the secretary general and other officials in the department on February 22nd.
Many members present, the memo said, “expressed serious reservations about the tone of the document which spoke to greater state control, and various views were expressed, some positive and some negative about proposed membership of the Governing Authority/Board”.
The memo added: “The Department officials agreed to engage in further consultations with regard to the proposals but expressed determination to complete consultation by March 5th.”
“This is a very short timeline in which to reply to the Consultation Report. Therefore we have decided to put the Consultation Report on the agenda for discussion at the Board meeting of February 24th.”
The memo stated that a response to the legislation would be put together to meet the March deadline after consultation with Board and the Board Review Working Group. The Fellows are also set to be consulted on March 4th.
“However”, the memo continued, “we reserve our position that it will not be possible to complete any substantive consultation with the wider college community by March 5th, most especially the Fellows who have special responsibilities to ‘scrutinise and comment upon major College and university matters’, and that further discussion and meetings between the College and Departmental Officials will be required before any satisfactory consultation can be deemed to have taken place.”
“Therefore, it is proposed to consider the proposals in more depth at the Board meeting on 24 March along with the final report of the Board Review Working Group, which it is hoped will be completed by then.”
The Irish Universities Association expressed concerns about the proposal in a commentary – seen by this newspaper – saying “our primary focus needs to be on the appropriate balance between autonomy and accountability within the new legislation. In particular, there are a number of areas where accountability to the State risks being conflated with or merging into control by the State”.
