Professor Vincent Cunnane:

I can take the question on the TUA. All five technological universities plus the remaining two institutes of technology are now a part of a single sectoral representative body. We have brought everybody together. There have been many iterations of bodies to represent the technological sector over the years. Given the new technological universities, we wanted to show that it is a new start. We have brought everybody together. We have some funding from the Higher Education Authority for a short-term project that will run until next June. There is some State backing for that but only during the start-up phase. We will be self-funding thereafter.

We have advertised for a new CEO who will lead our advocacy side of things and present an integrated, single voice for the sector. I hope that the next time we are before the committee we will have a CEO here and the interface will be on a more regular basis. We are up and running. We have a project manager and a number of staff in place. The committee will hear a lot more about. We had a soft launch. In the near future, when we have a CEO, the committee can expect to hear more from the TUA.