Madam, – For a few years now, the universities have been operating under the Employment Control Framework (ECF), whose objective is to rein-in spending. It has led to a moratorium on hiring and promotion in the universities and institutes of technology. While we all realise that cuts have to be made, it is often the nature of the cuts that needs the greatest amount of scrutiny.
Under the new version of this framework, there is a cap on the numbers of staff in employment in the third-level sector, even if – and this is a crucial point – the money is provided by non-exchequer sources. This means, for instance, if IBM or the European Union or The Wellcome Trust wanted to fund a research project in a university using their own funds and paying the university a generous overhead fee for their participation, then it cannot go ahead if this means that too many people would then be working in that university. This situation would hold for all kinds of research projects.
The implications for Ireland’s fourth-level research environment are nothing short of calamitous. Our international collaborators also now face uncertainty of working with us – if funding is awarded, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to employ the staff because it might violate the ECF.
This surely means they will now go elsewhere for collaborators. This ostensibly cost-saving measure could end up costing us millions in lost direct investment and an untold amount of damage in terms of reputation, research competitiveness and employment for our brightest doctoral graduates.
We stand on the brink of being isolated internationally. Our competitiveness in the international research arena is facing a very uncertain future and if we really want to have a showcase to attract high-tech foreign direct investment then the ECF must be revisited, modified and a more imaginative solution must be implemented. – Is mise,