COMMITTEE OF TECHNIKON PRINCIPALS

SUBMISSION TO THE PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION ON THE DRAFT HIGHER EDUCATION AMENDMENT BILL, 2001

A This submission is made by the Committee of Technikon Principals (CTP). This body represents the collective interests of all 15 Technikons in the country who are the constituent members of the CTP.

B The period provided for responses to the revised version of the draft Amendment Bill was, once again, not adequate. The revised draft Bill was only received on 21 August and after submitting our comments on the first draft on 11 May 2001 to the Department of Education we have not been consulted in the subsequent amendment(s) to that draft.

C We have also, once again, not received any notification of the dates of the hearings of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Education on this Bill nor have we received an invitation to attend the hearings. We regard this as a serious infringement of democratic governance. A similar situation occurred in respect of the hearings on the Higher Education Amendment Bill, 2000 and we were assured that this would not be repeated.

D We therefore request that the CTP be afforded the opportunity for an oral presentation to elucidate our submission on the Bill to the Portfolio Committee on Education at the hearings on 30 August 2001..

SPECIFIC COMMENTS ON THE DRAFT HIGHER EDUCATION AMENDMENT BILL, 2000

1 INTRODUCTION

The CTP generally supports the provisions of the Bill. It however wishes to bring the following to the attention of the Portfolio Committee.

2 THE ESTABLISHING AND FUNCTIONS OF AN INTERIM COUNCIL

a Clauses 3 and 5 of the Bill amending Sections 20 and 23 of the Act, provides that the Minister must appoint an Interim Council. The CTP is of the opinion that the Minister should have the necessary discretion to establish an Interim Council or not and therefore proposes that the word must in these clauses be changed to may.

Circumstances could and do arise where there is no need for establishing an Interim Council, such as the recent incorporation of Colleges of Education into certain existing HE institutions where it would have been counter-productive for the Minister to have appointed an Interim Council.

b The amendment to Section 20 of the Act in the proposed new subsection 6, empowers the Interim Council with all functions of a Council with the exception of making an institutional statute. We submit that this would hinder the functioning of the established institution and that a new Council for such an institution created by a merger, would require specific provisions in its statute for the composition of its Council, Senate and Institutional Forum. A "Standard Institutional Statute" should only have to be applied in cases where an institution fails to prepare an institutional statute within a reasonable period that is pre-defined. We recommend that the wording of the Bill be suitably amended.

3 RESIGNATION OF COUNCIL

Clause 7 of the Bill adds subsections (8) and (9) to Section 27 of the Act to provide for the dissolution of the entire council where 75% or more of the members resign at a meeting. The CTP supports this amendment in principle However, the use of the term members rather than membership does not make allowance for vacancies on the council which may exist and resignations can also take place e.g. by written notice and not necessarily at a meeting. This provision could therefore cause practical difficulties for an institution. We recommend substitution of the word membership for members and deletion of the words "at a meeting".

4 REPEAL OF PRIVATE ACTS

Clause 7 of the Bill also amends Section 27 (1) of the principal act to provide for the repeal of the Private Acts, but CTP recommends that "any other law" is retained to emphasise the importance of taking into account other legislation (e.g. Labour Relations Act) in their governance by councils.

5 TRANSITIONAL ARRANGEMENTS PERTAINING TO THE CERTIFICATION COUNCIL FOR HIGHER EDUCATION (SERTEC)

Clause 25 of the Bill provides for the dissolution of SERTEC and sub-clause (5) provides that all assets of SERTEC are to devolve upon the CHE. The CTP submits that the assets of SERTEC were built-up, for all practical purposes, virtually entirely from the levies paid by technikons on all certificates, diplomas and degrees issued by the technikons. Although the CHE is to take over the functions of SERTEC, these functions are firstly, not the exclusive functions of the CHE or its Quality Committee as was the case with SERTEC, and secondly, it is widely known that the CHE will terminate and not continue with the SERTEC model of quality assurance and accreditation of programmes or institutions.

It is therefore not correct to make the assumption that the CHE is the "successor body" to SERTEC and should therefore receive all its assets upon the dissolution of SERTEC. Furthermore, the technikons' past contributions by way of the levies paid to SERTEC would therefore now become exclusively available to the CHE and/or its Quality Committee for any of its many functions as determined in the principle Act. We submit that this is unfair to the technikons which in the past, were already unfairly disadvantaged by their lower state subsidies when compared to other higher education institutions. We submit further that the assets of SERTEC should devolve upon the CTP, as a representative body of the technikons, for use as determined by the CTP for the benefit of technikons exclusively.

Although the CTP put a similar request to the Department of Education in an earlier submission, it has been ignored and not discussed with the CTP by the officials of the Department at all. We find this to be inconsistent with and a flagrant violation of the principle and spirit of "co-operative governance" as was stated previously by the Department as the manner in which it would function in the new dispensation.