Dr. Bryan Maguire:

I was going to pick up on that. For public providers, the Oireachtas has determined that there will be fewer education and training boards. The Oireachtas is currently debating the merger of institutes of technology to create technological universities, so consolidation can be imposed as a matter of public policy. For the community and voluntary sector, it is not for the public authorities to determine how to get economies of scale, but it is a traditional part of the trade union movement to come together in solidarity and to share where possible. Becoming a provider in a statutory sense incurs very serious responsibilities of scale that are different than what an individual local centre might want to take on. As far as we can see, there is nothing incompatible in a number of individual local centres coming together to form a network or consortium that would then collectively assume the legal responsibilities that go with being a statutory provider and entering into a relationship with QQI. If they do so, one of the advantages is that QQI can deal directly with the network representative, or the consortium leadership, however that is established. It is not for us to prescribe the governance or the legal structure to underpin that, but they need to be sufficiently robust to enable the consortium to carry out its legal responsibilities and ensure that the learners get access to quality.

It is not just a matter of making life easier for QQI. It is a matter of trying to get the best scales for improving the quality and accountability of the sector. This is a sector which historically did not have access to certification. That access came in under FETAC. What are now looking to do is ensure that the quality assurance extended to other sectors is now available and that level of guarantee is given to this particularly important and vulnerable group of learners.