Mr. Tom Boland:

From the HEA prospective, the Secretary General has said much of what I wanted to say. Over a period of about two years, from the end of 2010 until the inspector was appointed, the HEA sought to get information on the situation in WIT regarding the companies, even to the extent of nominating to a working group a retired senior civil servant to get access to sufficient information to allow the HEA and the Department to understand the relationship between the companies and the institute. For a variety of reasons that do not lie at the door of the institute, it proved impossible to get the kind of detailed information necessary. This, ultimately, led to the appointment by the Minister of an inspector. In hindsight, it is not appropriate that a body like the HEA must wait two years and wait for the exercise of fairly extraordinary statutory powers to get information of this kind. The reason we were reluctant to recommend to the Minister the appointment of an inspector earlier is that it is a draconian action, potentially seriously impacting upon the reputation of an institution. This is only the third time an inspector has been appointed.

I mentioned earlier that we are looking at the area of governance and regulation and the role of the HEA. One of the areas I am interested in exploring is whether there are activities we can engage in that are less draconian and less impactful on the reputation of the institution. If the appointment of an objective person to an institution to investigate an issue was more commonplace in circumstances where there are difficulties without necessarily requiring the involvement of the Minister, it does not become such a major issue in reputational terms. It would enable an agency like the HEA to have a more forensic examination of particular issues at particular times. I say that with the benefit of hindsight. It took two years and then six months for an excellent report from Mr. Quigley. Had we waited six months and had the Minister appointed Mr. Quigley sooner, it would have been resolved in that way. That is not to rationalise it out of existence but to explain the situation.