Election to Seanad Eireann 2011 - NUI Consitituency

Donncha O'Connell

PRESS RELEASE

For immediate release on 13/3/2011

STATEMENT ON EXTENSION OF EMPLOYMENT CONTROL
FRAMEWORK (ECF) FROM DONNCHA O'CONNELL - SEANAD
ELECTION CANDIDATE (NUI PANEL)

Employment Control Freakery for Ireland's third-level system

The Higher Education Authority (HEA) issued, in the dying days of the outgoing discredited government, an extraordinarily damaging set of instructions to Ireland's third-level institutions, in the form of the second version of the Orwellian-sounding "Employment Control Framework"or ECF.

The ECF is a fundamental threat to the third-level sector in Ireland and must be opposed.

It purports to impose new unheard-of limits on the ability of working academics to deliver on the vast potential the third-level sector holds for our society. The ECF does this by requiring all third-level institutions to restrict, subject to the diktats to the HEA and the Department of Finance, recruitment of all types, most remarkably in respect of the many research jobs which academics create by successfully competing for external funding, both here and abroad.

The ECF would penalise high-achieving acadmics in building research teams, offering job and study opportunities to those very highly qualified and motivated young researchers who are meant to be central to our economic future. The ECF would place approval for such externally-funded research projects in the hands of a centralised bureaucracy which clearly has no practical conception of how the search for knowledge happens in modern and diverse society.

Already, a range of senior academics have expressed in the strongerst terms their concern as to the damage - both immediate and long-term - that the ECF will do to the whole third-level system (see below). I fully share their concerns, and am determined to take the fight forward in my Seanad election campaign.

The new government has no reason to continue with this failed approach to employment in the third-level sector. I call upon the new Minister for Education, Ruairi Quinn TD, and the new Minister of State for Research and Innovation, Seán Sherlock TD to:

  • Immediately rescind the operation of the extended ECF and,
  • Consult widely and seriously with all relevant stakeholders, particular with working academics, and young early-stage researchers, on future funding models, rather than relying on centralised bureaucracies such as the HEA, which have clearly failed to do their job.

This sorry tale underlines the need for third-level to have effective representation in the public sphere, sadly lacking so far, given how such an evidently damaging policy move can emerge without effective opposition. It is shameful that matters have come to this stage.

I will pursue, vigorously and effectively, an agenda that truly values third-level education and research, in all their dimensions, not just the purely economic or commercial.

Biographical details available at: /biography/

For further information on the Employment Control Framework see:

http://universitydiary.wordpress.com/2011/03/13/irish-higher-education-the-new-employment-control-framework/

For previous commentary by others on the ECF see:

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