Mr. Frank Vaughan:

I thank the Chairman and members for the opportunity to make this presentation, for which we are grateful. We are pleased to discuss this issue with the committee. We represent the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, which has an interest in this area and in the broader areas of vocational training and further education. We are here as a national social partner organisation that has been proactive in this respect at a policy level over the years. We are also here as a body that, through various trade unions, provides a range of training courses for trade unionists and for our members in a variety of sectors. As training providers, we are actively addressing what we still call the lifelong learning agenda, which involves trying to upskill our members. The Congress Centres Network, which operates under the auspices of Congress, was set up in the 1980s as a network of centres for the unemployed.

Most members of the committee will remember the 1980s. Unfortunately, we are repeating some of the experiences of that time. For example, we have to respond to high levels of unemployment, particularly youth unemployment. The committee will be more than well aware of those issues. That network is in essence part of the community and voluntary sector. All the constituent centres that are part of the network are autonomous providers which work in communities to provide services to the unemployed. It should be noted that Congress has a formal community sector committee, which is concerned with trying to further develop the sector. My colleague, Ms Claudia Darley, is a member of that committee. My other colleague, Ms Aileen Morrissey, is responsible for training within Mandate, which is one of our bigger trade unions. The three pillars I have mentioned are represented in our delegation.

I do not want to take up too much of the committee's time. We acknowledge the huge challenges faced by Quality and Qualifications Ireland, QQI, which is a new body that is taking over the role of its predecessors. One of those challenges relates to certification and accreditation needs . We continue to enjoy a good relationship with QQI. We have always found QQI personnel to be very professional, approachable and committed.

We are aware that the fee structure which is being proposed is predicated on the fundamental question of resources. We recognise that resources are a key consideration. Congress is not formally opposed, in principle, to the idea of fees being charged as appropriate. However, we are opposed to measures that we perceive as being unfair or counter-productive. We are concerned that some elements of the proposed fee structure do not adequately reflect the environment in which much of the community and voluntary sector is operating. The introduction of fees, which may or may not be subvented by the State from other sources, would be an added burden for many organisations in that sector, which are essentially operating on a financial knife edge. It could be a decisive factor in determining whether community sector providers on a financial knife edge continue to be viable.

Many training providers in this sector do not have multi-annual funding. Certain requirements are often associated with the funding they get. The State funding these providers get from a variety of sources is often contingent on their ability to certify training. Congress certainly welcomes the development of accredited training. We want to see people being certified for training. In the absence of multi-annual funding, it is often difficult to put in place training courses that can lead to a major award. The timescale militates against providing such courses on an annual basis. If providers are not in a position to offer major awards, that can undermine their whole funding base. We see that as being a particularly critical factor.

Congress, like everyone in this room, is committed to a further education system that is centred on the learner. We need to get people into the system in the first instance. We need to get the bottom rung of people to engage with what we hope will be a ladder of progression in their training and certification. The community and voluntary sector has traditionally and historically had a unique and key role in accessing such people and bringing them into the system. Engaging such learners is intrinsically more resource intensive. It often requires one-to-one interventions to explain to people the benefits of getting involved in training. If we are to have a system that is generally coherent and equitable, we must ask why we should risk, through the introduction of further charges, prejudicing the ability of the sector to continue in this role. It has been acknowledged that the community and voluntary sector has an inherent awareness of, and flexibility, responsiveness and alertness to, the basic needs of learners. Nobody else has that access. I will not go into the detail of this aspect of the matter. Some of it was noted in our formal presentation. The ability to try to innovate, not only in terms of content but also in terms of the development of new programmes, could be undermined by a fee structure that would be simply untenable for many of those organisations.

We have noted QQI's policy document on fees. I acknowledge and applaud QQI for its efforts in communicating its strategy and developing and circulating policy documents. There is an opportunity to engage in a debate with QQI. I suppose this is a continuing part of that. We note QQI's statement that "the determination of fees will have regard to the nature, type and mission of providers and the programmes they offer". The policy document makes it clear there is an inherent flexibility in QQI's capacity to determine fees. The document also provides that "exemptions and waivers may be provided for in specified circumstances". I would like to set out the fundamental position of Congress in this regard, but I cannot speak on behalf of Congress other than by mentioning that the Congress Centres Network is a member of the community education network of Aontas - the national adult education body - which has made its views on this matter known to QQI. Aontas would take the same fundamental position, which is that fees should not be introduced at this scale and level and should certainly not be introduced up to level 5, in terms of the old FETAC levels. Historically, social welfare recipients and medical card holders have not been charged certification fees when they would have undertaken training. While there is no current proposal to change that, we note that it is to be kept under review. Notwithstanding the other comments we have made about the fee structure, we think it would be a retrograde step if that position were to be changed. I have set out the fundamentals of our position.