Dáil debates

Thursday, 14 December 2017

Technological Universities Bill 2015: Report Stage

 

2:55 pm

Photo of Mary Mitchell O'ConnorMary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Burton. If she has specific examples, I would be very pleased to look at them. She has definitely raised gender and equality within third level institutions. I have set up a task force and on Committee Stage I accepted an amendment from Deputy Thomas Byrne to address gender balance on academic councils and to provide that at least 40% of a governing body of a technological university shall be women. The Bill also provides in section 12 that in making regulations relating to the conduct of elections, seeking nominations for appointments and the appointment of members to a governing body, a technological university shall have regard to the objective that at least 40% of members shall be men and 40% shall be women.

On 6 November 2017, I noted my concern about women progressing to professorships and I remain concerned. Only 19% of women are at professor level across the institutes and we have never had a woman president in 425 years of the university sector. I have set up a task force to look at this directly and to come back with solutions. Ms Máire Geoghegan-Quinn produced an excellent report in 2016 and the task force is going through its recommendations to establish how we can ensure that women come to the fore as they should. Organisations which recognise male and female talent are much better. That is what I want from my task force. As to any specific examples the Deputy has, the legislation guarantees at section 50 the terms and conditions of current staff. I am happy with that. It is there in black and white.

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