Dr. Andrew P. Allen:

Just to go back to Deputy Ó Laoghaire's questions about where we are going, I think it speaks to the need for better and more reliable data within the HEI sector so that we can say with some authority how many research staff are going where. Reference was made to the UK. I know that with Brexit, they were struggling and there has been a lot of anxiety around the European funding that everyone is chasing. To reference a specific example from the UK, Bristol University has followed a really good model for a number of years that features tracks. There is a research track whereby staff can go further in their careers up to research professor level. In Ireland, most of the time people are trying to segue from being a post-doctoral researcher to a lecturer. They often change. It speaks to Mr. Marjoram's point that sometimes there is a different focus on research or teaching. Something like the Bristol model could be interesting to look at in Ireland.

Just to speak to Deputy Ó Ríordáin's point, we are talking about investment and the value of it here. We are not just looking for a big tranche of funding. Ms Griffin has touched on the issue of contracts of indefinite duration and specific purpose contracts. Research staff just want to be treated the same way most people in most sectors are treated, so that if someone works in a particular organisation for a number of years, he or she should have the same entitlement to be kept on and his or her work should be recognised after working in the sector for long enough.