Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the delegates and thank them for their submissions. We should also thank those who provided written submissions but were not invited to appear because they generally had not updated those submissions.

That brings me to the point of why this engagement is taking place. Ideally, the committee would have held this discussion far earlier in the process, but because the Bill was very quickly referred to the Seanad, we did not have the opportunity to so do. It is important to ay that because we are very late in the passage of the Bill at this stage. Second Stage in the Dáil has been completed and the Bill has passed all Stages in the Seanad. All that remains are Committee and Report Stages in the Dáil. Nevertheless, I welcome some of the strengthening of the Bill by the Seanad and wish to ask some questions about what we might be able to do on some of the issues of concern to the delegates.

I will address first the Aontas presentation because community education should not have to pay what are relatively substantial amounts of money for the sector. The issues surrounding re-engagement fees, etc. have already put a lot of pressure on it. I do not know if it is possible to address that issue at this stage. Obviously, we cannot submit amendments. Perhaps the delgates might elaborate on the effect on the sector of being included in the learner fund.

I take the point made by the Chairman that we are not strictly responsible for employment law. However, in her contribution in the Dáil last week the Minister of State, Deputy Mitchell O'Connor, specifically referred to it and Mr. King's appointment, which I welcome. Like Deputy Thomas Byrne, I am interested in hearing from Mr. King on the progress that is being made. It seems that there must be agreement on employment law rights from the various parties involved. I understood from the Minister of State that if there was agreement, it would be subject to employment law. I seek clarity on exactly how that will work. I take the point that the employment law aspect is not within the remit of the committee, but as it is in the Bill, we need to get answers on it.

I refer to the issue raised by Deputy Thomas Byrne that, essentially, the good operators within the system will end up paying the costs of the bad operators. There is a lot of tightening up in the system in how English language schools, in particular, can operate. Obviously, they cannot do the things that were done in the past. I should acknowledge that I was involved in the early stages of this process. I presume standards are already high as a result of the international education mark. What size of fund will be needed if we already have strict procedures to be registered for the mark? That is something we need to know. Will the sector have to pay a substantial amount of money or are relatively small amounts of money envisaged in comparison with what is in the sector? Mr. Anako made a fair point about whether these measures will act as encouragement for people that things will be okay, even if they do something wrong because somebody else will bear the cost. Is there an issue as to why the State is taking this burden on itself? How will those with private insurance be affected by the new regulations?

A point was raised by the university sector, by Mr. Purser in particular, about duplication in registering with QQI. Dr. Murray spoke about the transparency mechanism. Do the representatives of QQI or the Department consider it necessary to place this extra requirement on the sector?