Northern Ireland Assembly Flax Flower Logo

COMMITTEE FOR EDUCATION

MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS
Wednesday, 28 January 2009
Room 144, Parliament Buildings

Present:
Mr M Storey (Chairperson)
Mr D Bradley (Deputy Chairperson)
Mrs M Bradley
Mr T Elliott
M T Lunn
Mr N McCausland
Mr B McCrea
Miss M McIlveen
Mr J O’Dowd
Ms M O’Neill
Mr E Poots

In Attendance:
Mr J Simmons (Assembly Clerk)
Mr A Hicks (Assistant Assembly Clerk)
Mrs R Donnelly (Assistant Assembly Clerk)
Mr D Douglas (Clerical Supervisor)
Mr B Morgan (Clerical Officer)

The Chairperson opened the meeting at 10.03am in public session. He welcomed Tom Elliott to his first meeting of the Committee for Education and thanked Ken Robinson for his work on this Committee and referred to his work on the Committee during the previous mandate.

1. Apologies

Mr Bradley joined the meeting at 10.04am.

There were no apologies.
2. Minutes of the Meeting of 21 January 2009

Agreed – the Committee approved the draft minutes of the meeting of 21 January 2009 subject to minor amendment.

Miss McIlveen joined the meeting at 10.05am.

3. Matters Arising

Agreed – the Committee would schedule consideration of the Report into its forward work programme.

Mr McCausland joined the meeting at 10.09am.

Agreed – the Committee would write to ‘Love for Life’ to confirm that it would consider this request at a later date taking into consideration the work commitments of the Committee and invite ‘Love for Life’ to submit a summary of the issues they wish to raise with the Committee in the interim.

Agreed – the Committee would forward this correspondence to the Minister of Education as requested.

Agreed – the Committee would forward the correspondence to the Minister of Education as requested.

4. Correspondence

Agreed – the Committee would write to Holy Trinity College to confirm that it would consider this request at a later date taking into consideration the work commitments of the Committee and, in particular, its current scrutiny of the Education Bill.

Agreed – the Committee would forward this correspondence to the Department of Education for a response to the issues raised.

Agreed – the Committee would write to Keady Primary School to advise that the Chairperson and Deputy Chairperson would meet with the School’s Board of Governors once the Department’s response has been received.

Agreed – the Committee would revisit how best to handle invitations to meet with schools and other interested organisations to take account of the Committee’s workload.

Agreed – the Committee would forward this correspondence to the Department of Education for a response to the issues raised.

Agreed – the Committee agreed that any member wishing to attend would advise the Clerk.

Agreed – the Committee would forward this correspondence to the Department of Education for a response to the issues raised.

Agreed – the Committee agreed that any member wishing to attend would advise the Clerk.

5. Education Bill

Gavin Boyd, Designate CEO of ESA, John McGrath, Deputy Secretary, and Mark Browne, Programme Director of the ESA Implementation Team (ESAIT) joined the meeting at 10.18am.

Mr McCrea joined the meeting at 10.20am
Mr Poots joined the meeting at 10.26am

The officials gave a presentation on designing modern education services, the methodology followed by ESAIT, the workshops held with education managers and answered questions on a number of issues, including: the availability of draft costed organisational structures showing local and regional staff allocations for the 20 service areas; whether as a result of the workshops held, agreement had been reached on regional and local functional splits in services; the number of local area teams; the risks in the process of moving from old to new centralised IT systems; whether the centralisation of some functions would be Belfast-centric; expressed levels of satisfaction regarding the workshops held; centralisation of the procurement of services with potential for an adverse impact on small local providers; the level of influence of the local advisory committees; establishment of a mechanism for local decision making; change in emphasis for the ESA from cost savings to educational outcomes; range of figures for projected savings to be made from voluntary redundancies; concerns regarding the potential loss of key experienced staff through the voluntary redundancy process; potential for greater rationalisation and savings within administration and redirection of funds to front-line services.

Mr McCrea left the meeting at 11.26am

The Chairperson thanked the witnesses for an informative briefing and the ESAIT Programme Director left the meeting at 11.28am.

Ms O’Neill left the meeting at 11.29am
Mr T Elliott left the meeting at 11.29am

Gavin Boyd, Designate CEO of ESA and John McGrath, Deputy Secretary, began the second presentation at 11.29am. They were later joined by Catherine Daly, Head of Finance Division at 11.56am.

Ms O’Neill rejoined the meeting at 12.05pm

The officials gave a presentation on ESA Outline Business Case and answered questions on a number of issues, including: when the full business case will be finalised; existing E&LBs shared services and where the main savings in the OBC will come from; potential for rationalisation of education initiatives; the administrative burden on teachers and principals; potential further savings in administration costs; whether ESA will take over responsibility for pension schemes; position of those teachers whose applications for voluntary redundancies were lodged before and after November 2008; the official’s growing confidence that the projected savings would be achieved and in the OBC generally.

Agreed – that the Committee would write to the Department of Education requesting the following information:

The Chairperson thanked the witnesses for an informative briefing and the officials left the meeting at 12.17pm.

6. Forward Work Programme

The Committee noted and approved the amended Forward Work Programme incorporating two new items - Budget Briefing and Stocktake Update.

7. Any Other Business
8. Date, Time and Place of Next Meeting

The Committee agreed that the next meeting will be held on Wednesday 4 February 2009 at 10.00am in Room 144, Parliament Buildings.

The Chairperson adjourned the meeting at 12.20pm.
Mr Mervyn Storey
Chairperson, Committee for Education
4 February 2009

21 January 09 / Menu