Mr. Michael Kelly:

Specifically regarding technological universities, I was a member of the Hunt groups which prepared the strategy on higher education a number of years ago. During the course of this, the concept of the technological university first emerged. Shortly after that, after leaving the HEA, the consortium forming in Dublin involving DIT, Tallaght and Blanchardstown asked me to take on the role of chairing the steering group, which is made up of the three chairmen and presidents. I have worked with this group since 2011 in working through the various stages of the pre-designation process, namely, stage 1 to stage 3 in the case of the Dublin consortium, which is also the stage reached by the Munster consortium, with which I have had no contact. In Dublin, we have come through the first evaluation by an international panel at stage 3.

That cleared us to move to stage 4, work that is under way. To my mind, the project has gone very well. We would have the same support needs in terms of financing and so on as other consortia and will be talking to the HEA about that issue. That is the background. I was able to bring that experience-----