Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 March 2018
249. Deputy Thomas Pringle asked the Minister for Education and Skills when the report commissioned by his Department regarding governance and accountability of education centres will be published; the key recommendations contained in the report; the fee paid to a company (details supplied) to carry out the report; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13599/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraEducation Centres are independent statutory bodies under Section 37 of the Education Act (1998) and are managed by voluntary management committees elected annually and comprised mainly of teachers.
My Department is the main funder of Education Centres through direct budget allocations for administrative staff pay and operating costs. The Education Centres also receive significant funding from the support services which are funded entirely by my Department for the purpose of designing and delivering continuing professional development courses and other professional support for teachers throughout the country.
In general, the Department is undertaking significant efforts to further develop and implement consistent and robust governance arrangements across the education sector. This work is guided by a management board committee on sectoral governance chaired by the Secretary General and supported by a sectoral governance unit which undertakes work which supports the enhancement and standardisation of governance and accountability oversight across the Department, including implementation of the Code of Practice for Governance of State Bodies.
With regard to Education Centres, the Department has embarked upon a programme of governance modernisation to complement and update the previous requirements that Education Centres are required to observe, and in line with a desire to continually improve the governance and accountability structure in the sector. This programme will be informed by the Mazars Review of the Department’s Governance, Funding and Accountability arrangements for Education Support Centres. The Department plans to circulate the final report to all Education Centres in the coming weeks and it would be remiss of me to pre-empt the recommendations in that report. In addition, there have been developments in governance requirements for state funded bodies as outlined in the Code of Practice for State Bodies which need to be reflected in the sector
As the OGP framework under which the contract was awarded to Mazars is still live, it would not be appropriate to release commercially sensitive information which may disadvantage either the contractors or the awarding authority in future mini competitions.
