James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This is my first opportunity to address the House since my appointment to this very important brief. It is an honour to hold it and I look forward to working on the sector with the Deputies opposite and all Deputies of the House. I acknowledge that Deputy Boyd Barrett has an interest in the area of higher education, innovation and research, the pursuit of curiosity and the pursuit of knowledge. We have debated these topics in the past and I look forward to continuing that engagement on this very important topic.

I thank the Deputies for raising the issue of the situation at BIMM. I anticipated that it would ventilated before the Dáil. It is welcome that this is happening. I welcome the workers and thank them for being here. I certainly am very sympathetic to their plight. I have been reading about the situation and I have been reading media reports about the proposed restructuring, as it is labelled, and the industrial dispute that has flowed from that. I do not like what I have read and I am concerned about the situation and the impact on staff and students. As the Deputies are aware and as has been acknowledged at the outset, the difficulty is that BIMM is a private company. Neither I, nor any other Minister, have any statutory role or powers to exercise in this matter. I understand and take the point that has been made that TUD is engaged in collaborative provision with BIMM to deliver a small number of programmes. From what I have been told, the arrangement seems to include academic quality assurance and protection of learner arrangements. However, it is BIMM acting as a private provider that appears to have responsibility for staffing, organisational structures and the working terms and conditions of staff. I looked at the BIMM website and it declares that it is a private limited company because it gives the Companies Registration Office, CRO, number and so forth, so it is a private entity. I also note that it has operations across Europe and the UK. Berlin, Hamburg, Birmingham, Manchester and Bristol are all listed as sites where it operates.

Furthermore, it does not receive any funding from my Department or from the State, that I am aware of. Issues pertaining to the governance of the terms and conditions of the staff employed do not fall within the remit of my Department. That notwithstanding, like any Member of the House, I am concerned anytime there is the suggestion of redundancies, be it at BIMM or at any other company or organisation in the State. I understand completely that the staff of BIMM are worried by management proposals. Apparently BIMM is saying that its actions are in the best interests of the students and the organisation. I am not in a position to assess those claims. It would probably be unhelpful for me to get into trying to arbitrate or adjudicate on the dispute. My primary concern is for the students and staff, based on what I have read and what has been reported. I have been following the issue. The reality, however, is that there are very few, if any, levers available to me as Minister to intervene in any industrial relations dispute, particularly one that involves a private sector organisation.

I strongly urge all parties - with this being directed more at the company than the workers, who have made their availability known - to engage in the industrial relations machinery of the State. The Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, stands ready to engage. I encourage all parties to think seriously about where the path leads them next. That may be a very helpful avenue to pursue a resolution. I am sure the Deputies and the workers will be interested to hear that the president of TUD has agreed to meet with the relevant union, the Irish Federation of University Teachers, IFUT, to discuss the concerns. That is a welcome development and I hope that will perhaps assist in moving the dispute forward.

See this speech in context