A motion, previously passed by the Derry & Strabane District Council and proposed by a People Before Profit councillor, sought the universities’ views on a report from the Royal Irish Academy (RIA), a leading expert body in Ireland.

The RIA highlighted the absence of a higher education strategy in Northern Ireland, underscoring the need for oversight. It specifically recommended establishing an independent oversight body for higher and further education. The report, which focuses on enhancing third-level regional collaboration in the northwest, noted that Northern Ireland is “the only region within these islands without a tertiary education oversight body providing independent advice to the government.”

The report added: “It is hard to imagine a higher education oversight body supporting the current geographically skewed distribution of places or concluding that such a concentration serves economic, cultural, or social cohesion interests.”

However, Dr. Ryan Feeney, Vice President of Queen’s University Belfast (QUB), stated he was satisfied that the Public Services Ombudsman in Northern Ireland already offers “appropriate oversight,” arguing that no additional provisions for higher education are necessary. QUB also expressed support for expanding university offerings in the northwest.

Ulster University (UU) Vice Chancellor Paul Bartholomew called the recommendation for an independent oversight body “underexamined” in the RIA report. He argued that similar bodies elsewhere do not regulate student numbers or their distribution and noted that a previous oversight body in Northern Ireland, which was dissolved in the 2000s, had “no impact” on student distribution. Bartholomew also emphasized that the oversight proposed in the report conflicts with the autonomous nature of universities.

At a council meeting, Sinn Fein also opposed independent oversight, with Councillor Emma McGinley asserting that elected representatives already fulfil this role. However, Gerry McKenna, the report’s author and former Vice Chancellor of the University of Ulster (1999-2006), disagreed. He argued that ministers need “independent expert advice,” even though ultimate decisions rest with the Minister and the Department for the Economy.

McKenna noted that the establishment of a task force to increase student numbers at UU’s Magee campus shows that university autonomy is limited.

He argued it is “incontrovertible” that Northern Ireland should have independent oversight, questioning not why it should have oversight, but why it doesn’t already.

He pointed out that the former Northern Ireland Higher Education Council (NIHEC), though limited in scope, did advise on student numbers and research distribution. Its recommendations led to significant expansion at Magee, which was welcomed by the university at the time. McKenna suggested that a body akin to the Higher Education Authority in the Republic of Ireland would be appropriate for Northern Ireland. He proposed that such a body could offer independent advice on higher and further education, and could be made more cost-effective by leveraging resources from oversight bodies in England, Scotland, or Ireland.

Shaun Harkin, who proposed the motion, expressed alarm at the universities’ opposition to an oversight body. He argued that institutions like UU should be held accountable by the government and claimed that a survey in the northwest would show public support for such oversight.

The Derry University Group, a campaign organization, criticized Bartholomew’s stance, arguing that his defence of university autonomy essentially acknowledges responsibility for the current uneven distribution of student places. They assert that a proper scrutiny body could ensure a more balanced regional distribution, with a minimum of 6,000 full-time student places being transferred from Belfast to Magee, in line with the commitments made under the New Decade, New Approach agreement.