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

I am ready to continue. We were talking about tenure. I had said that as students are not employees their time within the institution is, by definition, limited. This issue includes the right to free expression. Any claim that this right has been restricted, or any fear that voicing a contrarian opinion would invite academic retribution, can be better challenged through the existing charters and policies, which set out a detailed process for consideration and redress where necessary. I understand that such policies and processes have been already agreed with student representatives at local level and that they have been formally adopted by each of the academic councils.

Amendment No. 23, tabled by Deputy Funchion, proposes changes to section 15 of the Bill, which provides for the composition of the academic council of a technological university. As I outlined during the Committee Stage debate, section 15 provides that the governing body of each technological university, including its student members, shall have the flexibility to decide the overall number of members the academic council should have, including the number of students.

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