I move:
That a supplementary sum not exceeding £10 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on 31st day of December, 1975, for grants-in-aid of an tÚda-rás um Ard-Oideachas, certain Higher Education Institutions and Services and the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies.
The purpose of this Supplementary Estimate is to enable the Governing Body of the National Institute for Higher Education, Dublin, which has recently been established and which held its first meeting on 19th June, to begin its work by providing it with office accommodation, staff and essential facilities.
I am not asking the House to provide more than a token sum of £10 in this respect. The total sum which may be necessary in addition to the token Estimate will be found within the provision which has already been made in Vote 33 for Higher Education. All the subheads in this vote are, however, grants-in-aid, and it is necessary to have the agreement of the House before money can be made available under a new grant-in-aid subhead. What is now proposed is that a subhead, B.3—National Institute for Higher Education, Dublin— Current Expenditure—be opened in this Vote with a provision of £50,000, and that a subhead B.1—National Institute for Higher Education. Lim-erick—Current Expenditure—be reduced by a corresponding sum taking account of the token provision.
The National Institute for Higher Education, Dublin, and the National Institute for Higher Education, Limerick, will, as I have said on other occasions in discussing the Government's decision of 13th December, 1974, be the crowning institutions in what is known as the integrated sector of higher education. The governing bodies of the two institutions have been established and have held their first meetings. Each has elected a chairman and nominated ten of its members to serve on the reconstituted National Council for Educational Awards. I met both governing bodies together on the occasion of their first meeting and I have recently, as part of the continuing consultation and exchange of views, which I have been having with higher education interests, had a meeting with a deputation from the governing body of NIHE, Dublin, whose chairman and members are most anxious to begin their work.
In my address to the new governing bodies on 19th June, I stressed the central role which the institutes are to play in higher education. That role, as envisaged by the Government is such that the governing bodies must work in close liaison with each other and with other education institutions within the system. Indeed, this was one of the reasons why I thought it desirable that it be arranged that the two bodies should meet together at the very beginning of their work.
I have referred to the need for close liaison between the two NIHEs and between the NIHEs and other educational institutions. In that connection I have in mind especially the regional technical colleges. I emphasise this need for close liaison —and this involves careful planning and co-ordination of activities, not simply polite exchange of views and expression of good will—so that the students may derive the maximum benefit possible from the system which we are providing.
It is not that we are pursuing rationalisation for the sake of rationalisation. We are, of course, committed to endeavouring to ensure that we obtain the best return educationally, and without any dilution of quality in that education, from the considerable resources which we must expend on the provision of higher education. The students of the regional technical colleges, for example, will, as I said in my address to the governing bodies of the NIHEs, and I quote:
... expect and rightly demand that programmes will be so planned and structured that the possibility of transfer at appropriate levels between regional technical colleges and between regional technical colleges and NIHEs, will be a reality and a smooth process once a student has attained the appropriate standard at a particular level and has the motivation and capacity to move to a higher level.
To this end the governing bodies of the NIHEs must ensure that where students of a regional technical college have to transfer from their home college to pursue courses at a higher level in a NIHE, the necessary places, programmes of study and facilities will be available to them. The regional technical colleges have been given a strong representation on the NIHE governing bodies and in turn, these governing bodies, by whom two-thirds of the members of the reconstituted NCEA have already been nominated from among their members, have included among their nominees six principals of regional technical colleges.
We have no desire to see developed a rigid separation of institutions with consequential duplication of courses. One of the basic purposes of the Government's plan is to make possible in the interest of students mobility and transfer between all educational institutions. The whole purpose of this plan would be defeated if the NIHE, Dublin, one of the central institutions in the sector and the NIHE, Limerick, were to develop independently of each other and without regard to the needs of the regional technical colleges. I feel sure that with the regional technical colleges strongly represented on the governing bodies of the NIHEs and in the reconstituted NCEA we will see the end of fragmentation and unco-ordinated effort.
The change to a situation where institutions will be inter-related and their activities co-ordinated, while retaining that measure of freedom and flexibility which will enable each institution to make its full and vital contribution to our overall educational provision, without sacrificing its own individual identity or being deprived of the opportunity to make its own unique contribution to that provision, is not being left to chance. The NCEA will be reconstituted to, and I quote the words used in the Government's decision:
plan and co-ordinate courses and to validate and award non-degree third-level qualifications in the NIHEs, Dublin and Limerick, and in the regional technical colleges.
This planning and co-ordinating function is calculated to ensure that no institution within the integrated sector of higher education, be it large or small, will be tempted to chart its own course of development independently of other institutions.
The NIHE Limerick has been successfully established. The chairman and members of the newly established governing body of the NIHE, Dublin, are most anxious and eager to undertake the challenging task of making the NIHE Dublin a reality. This Supplementary Estimate is being introduced to enable them to undertake that task.