College Tribune | September 16 2008
eductional spending, regime
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News: Investigations
UCD top brass receive €300,000 allowances ■■ Jennifer Bray Twelve of UCD’s management team have accumulated allowances of over €300,000, according to figures obtained by the College Tribune. Last October it was revealed how the Presidents of UCD and NUI Galway received unauthorised top-up allowances which resulted in a pay freeze for the university heads until the allowances were withdrawn. However, the latest figures reveal allowances of between €18,000 to €53,184 per person in addition to the staff’s basic salaries. Vice President for Capital and Commercial Development, Eamonn Ceannt, received an allowance of €53,184, while the Registrar and Vice President for Academic Affairs Philip Nolan was paid €35,469. Other payments include €25,000 for the
Vice President for Innovation and Corporate Partnership, Mark Keane, and other various College Principals. In a separate finding, it has emerged that some of those receiving allowances are also eligible for annual bonuses of up to 20%. The Vice President for University Relations, Padraig Conway, is listed as a recipient of an annual allowance to the sum of €25,000, while also being in line for a bonus of 20%, with the reason cited as “In recognition of significant progress having been achieved in relation to agreed targets”. According to a senior lecturer in the college, Gerald Mills, the figure of €300,000 is only for the 12 members
of senior management and “it could now be the case that members of staff underneath these 12 are also receiving allowances”. Mills has also called into question the existence of allowances in colleges other than UCD. “If these kinds of payments are being made in UCD, we can be sure they are in place in other universities. It is not right that it should be UCD consistently in the spotlight while other colleges and universities get off the hook.” A spokesman for UCD said “These allowances are paid in respect of a range of functions which attach to the posts in question. “They are approved by the Finance Committee of the Governing Authority and are fully notified to the Higher Education Authority on a regular basis.”
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demic loss administration staff is estimated at a cost of between three and five million euro. The figures also reveal a loss of 21 technical staff to the college in the past year. This comes in a week in which Minister for Education Batt O’Keeffe has signalled he would personally back the return of third level tuition fees. “There is a mentality out there,
mainly of Batt O’Keeffe’s promotion that all the universities need to do is shift the budget around and all will be hunky dory. This could not be further from the truth. The budget is not big enough, and this is the message that needs to be constantly driven home. Even the wisdom of Solomon could not fix the funding crisis in the way the government proposes” concludes Jennings.
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