Mr. William Beausang:

I will very quickly make a point of clarification. The Minister who can apply for the establishment of a joint labour committee is the Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation. It would be a matter for the Minister for Education and Skills to make a request of that Minister. The IUA representative raised the question of who is the custodian of the national framework of qualifications. To be fair, that area has evolved over the years since the framework was first established. The framework of qualifications is a really important part of our infrastructure in education generally. We have come to a point in the decision-making process that has been the subject of discussion this afternoon at which there must be a final decision-maker as to who goes on the framework. That is what has guided the approach of the Department and the Minister in this regard. We understand the perspective of the university sector. Fortunately we were able to satisfy the concerns of the technological sector. It might be a very extreme situation but legislation has to cater for any eventuality and we cannot have a situation in which a higher education institution could override the regulator established under statute and put a qualification on the framework the regulator did not believe should be on it. As I said, this is an extreme scenario and it is not possible to conceive of it happening in today's university sector, but legislation has to cater for such an eventuality.