Uncomfortable time for universities

ANALYSIS:Yesterday's Dáil finance committee meeting was little short of a PR disaster for universities

AT THE close of yesterday's bruising meeting of the Dáil Public Accounts Committee, one senior university figure told The Irish Times: "This was like the Fás scandal for the universities. We were all made to look like Rody Molloy."

This was only a slight exaggeration after a meeting where universities were routinely accused of acting “unlawfully”and “illegally” in making unauthorised payments to staff.

The meeting proved to be particularly difficult for UCD president, Dr Hugh Brady, who found himself in a direct conflict of evidence with the chief executive of the Higher Education Authority (HEA), Tom Boland.

Brady claimed UCD had been given no detailed instruction that the additional payments to staff were unauthorised. Boland, in turn, cited a series of letters and other contact with UCD over a two-year period. At one stage he asked a question that elicited gasps from some present: “What part of ‘No’ does UCD not understand?”

In defending the HEA’s apparent delay in addressing the unlawful payments, Boland said it had acted on the reasonable assumption that universities were operating within the law.

In his own defence, Brady cited how additional allowances were also paid to secondary school principals and how they were common internationally.

But he failed to address the key issue of why UCD paid additional allowances of €1.6 million to senior staff without authorisation from the HEA or the department.

The pressure on Brady and UCD’s governing authority over this issue could intensify in the coming week. Boland told the committee yesterday “the book is not closed” on the issue.

Both he and a senior official from the Department of Education Kevin McCarthy raised the prospect of a sanction on UCD, something that would be very damaging to the reputation of both the university and its president.

Hugh Brady, dubbed “the Michael O’Leary of Irish education” is a very controversial figure. Critics accuse him of a “grey philistinism” and of driving a pro-business agenda, counter to the college’s history and tradition.

Admirers point to his success in transforming the “sleeping giant” that was UCD after he took office in 2004, making it one of the world’s top 100 universities.

The Public Accounts Committee meeting was disastrous in other respects for the universities. Under forensic scrutiny from Róisín Shortall of Labour, the HEA and the universities were slow to explain the kind of contact hours expected from lecturers.

Shortall spoke for many parents when she said Leaving Cert students – who worked hard to gain a college place – were often dispirited by the lack of instruction time in university.

At one stage, the spokesman for the university presidents told the committee university lecturers were not factory workers, not the kind of comment that will build public support for the sector.

The universities have done a very good job in making the case for more funding from fees or student loans. Many now agree with them that we cannot have a world-class education system without more funds. But yesterday’s tales of extravagance and excess will leave public and politicians asking if universities can be trusted with more money.