Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 27 September 2012

Public Accounts Committee

Special Report No. 78 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: Matters Arising out of Education Audits

11:00 am

Photo of Derek NolanDerek Nolan (Galway West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The issue is that the university was penalised, with the HEA providing the sanctions. It came to the conclusion that the university's actions were outside the framework. There is the issue of the three-month period, which cannot be divorced from the reality at the time, which was that the State was experiencing severe economic changes, with budgets reducing. It would have been very obvious that on the expiry of the employment control framework, another one would be put in place.

Much of what we deal with here relates to corporate governance. The cost of €32,000 is not the issue but rather that the HEA decided that, on this issue of corporate governance, the university stepped outside the bounds of what it is permitted to do, promoting 27 staff against the HEA's wishes and recommendations. It is more the principle of the matter as opposed to the financial cost. I am happy to take the witness's word that he was acting on bona fides. Nevertheless, the university engaged in a promotion practice during a period when an employment control framework was in place, with a view to promoting people at the end when it should have been clear that another framework was coming down the line.

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