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

Anyone who knows me will know that I am a strong advocate for gender equality and I have set up a task force. We will receive a report from that task force in March, which will outline ways we can ensure that women succeed in being promoted in our universities. I am sure the Senator knows as well as I do that the first university in Ireland was set up 425 years ago, and there has never been a woman president of a university in Ireland. I hope to see that happen very soon.

I note, however, that there are women presidents of institutes of technology. However, I do not just want to see presidents, I want to see women achieving professorships. The figures I have indicate that approximately 19% of professorships in Ireland are held by women. That means that of every 100 employees in senior lectureships with whom female students interact, they will see 81 men and only 19 women in such senior levels in third level institutions. This is despite the fact that the majority of students going to universities and institutes of technology now are young women. This is a very bad context for those young women to see when they get into the higher education institutes.

There are several provisions relating to gender equality in the Bill. Section 9(1)(q) of the Bill, states that one of the functions of a technological university shall be to "promote the attainment of gender balance and equality of opportunity among the students and staff of the technological university". Section 12(5)(b) also provides that in making regulations relating to conduct of elections, seeking of nominations for appointment and appointment of members to the governing body, the technological university "shall have regard to the objective that at least 40 per cent of members of the governing body shall be women and at least 40 per cent shall be men". I also accepted an amendment from Deputy Thomas Byrne on Committee Stage in the Dáil that addresses the gender balance issue for academic councils. It now provides that at least 40% of the academic council of a technological university shall be women and at least 40% shall be men. Furthermore, section 19 of the Bill provides for the preparation by a technological university of equality statements. These will specify its policies on the promotion of access and equality, including gender equality, in all activities of the technological university.

On 6 November I announced the establishment of the gender equality task force, which I have just referenced. This high-level task force will prepare a prioritised three-year action plan in consultation with stakeholders. This has been provided for in the Action Plan for Education. The task force will also oversee a national systems review of the policies and practices pertaining to recruitment and promotion that currently are in place in higher education institutions with a view to identifying good practice and highlighting areas that need improvement. This will feed into the development of actions for the action plan. The task force will build on work that was done by the HEA's national review on gender equality in Irish higher education, which was published in 2016. That report provided important analysis of the progress towards gender equality in Irish higher education institutions and made recommendations. The task force will now identify good practices in the higher education sector, including in those institutions that have been awarded Athena SWAN awards. It will also derive lessons from the experience of those institutions that have not been successful with the Athena SWAN application.Although all universities and ITs are signed up to the charter, I do not view the attainment of particular awards-based standards as necessarily appropriate for inclusion in legislation of this nature. I just do not see putting one specific award into legislation as the right way to go. I believe it is too prescriptive. We are talking about Athena SWAN silver. There is a higher award.