Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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It is not obligatory. The committee and the HEA feel it is necessary, and that is where it rests. Notwithstanding that, this university has not even given the accounts parallel with its own accounts. The issue of foundations and who controls what is huge. When NUI Galway, NUIG, appeared before us, it very proudly told the committee it had no control over it, so therefore there was no need to do this. Again, that office is on the campus site. It does not pay rent or anything. In fact, the question of why it would pay rent was laughed at.

There is a huge blurring of boundaries here that is not under scrutiny. That is of extreme concern to me. If the university does not control the foundation, it begs questions as to whether the foundation controls the university, the direction in which it is going or the nature of the buildings. Notwithstanding that very good things could come out of a foundation, it has to be done in an open and accountable way. In my view, that has not been done. If the president of a university says the university has no control over it and yet the president and the bursar of that university sits on its board, then there are serious issues. If there is a separate board in America, for example, with the president on that board as well, there are questions that have to be asked if we are to hold a system to account and achieve value for money, in particular when it came across repeatedly that more and more money was coming from the foundations, so the universities were not happy to have them scrutinised. The universities maintained that the foundations were entirely separate. They did not recognise that the universities are what they are because of public money. For the record, it is something I will be keeping a close eye on.