Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

Obviously, when we get more information back, we will come back to this. If we had got a copy of the university's risk register last year, it would not have shown up this. What else is the register likely not to include? Seeing it now, after this has been disclosed, yes, they are taking corrective action, but I am concerned we are not getting a full picture. That is one aspect. The business of universities is about creating knowledge. If NUI Maynooth is acknowledging the loss in respect of research and knowledge transfer, that is really at the core of what the university is supposed to be about. I am not sure we have fully fleshed out what this implies, and I would like to hear from the university what it means by "impact".

Regarding the number of staff, I completely accept that universities have people coming in and possibly doing several hours' additional work and that that is normal practice and adds to the value of the university. I think there are much greater employment protections at primary school level than at university level, not just in Maynooth but in the whole university sector. People going to college, who are very often the people paying for the staff, and their parents - and there are Government grants and so on towards tuition fees - do not appreciate that very often what is provided is perhaps one contact hour for every lecturing hour. I think great liberties are being taken in this regard. A total of 1,394 is a lot of people without contracts. We have spoken about this in the context of RTÉ and bogus self-employment, for example. Whereas this would not fall into the exact same category, it is a category of staff about whom I would have concerns as to how universities manage their accounts.

There is the other issue of how universities perform if not enough research hours are provided compared with contact hours. This shows up in our accounts, and that is the only reason it is appropriate for discussion here. However, we are hearing from the president of the college, not from the people who have a grievance about this. I think we are hearing a one-sided view on it, and I have concerns about that.