Mr. Karl Byrne:

To return to Ms Griffin's point about professional, managerial and support staff, I am the sector organiser at SIPTU for the education sector, so I represent everyone from professors all the way down to cleaners at the universities. We have members in the IOTs and the TUs, and in the old FÁS training centres that are now ETBs, such as the instructors, the administration staff and so on. Ms Griffin hit the nail on the head. The outsourcing happens at the lowest level, where institutions feel they can implement it. It happens at the levels of security, caretaking and cleaning. In the university sector, the majority of those roles are outsourced. The best example of where that is not done is at Trinity College, and I think the benefit of that can be seen there. Outsourcing is about saving money, not having to deal with various issues and so on.

Furthermore, due to the ECF, if additional people are needed, there is the question of whether they will be taken in on fixed-term contracts, through an agency or whatever the case may be. This is why we have requested that, if a decision is to be made, it will not be a fait accompli. Once we have a new model for the funding, we should sit down and discuss what the new model for the sector will be and how we can move it forward.