Foyle MP praises 'fearless advocate' Hargan

August 12th 2024

'A Scandal in Plain Sight' author Garrett Hargan presented Colum Eastwood with his new book at the SDLP leader's Derry offices today.

The Foyle MP said Hargan was 'a fearless advocate', who held government and universities to account, exhorting them deliver for the city-region.

Mr Eastwood said: "We have to keep the fight going, and this book will be an important contribution. Derry has been held back for too long and we're not going to put up with it much longer."

A Scandal in Plain Sight - Garrett Hargan

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Hargan launches investigation of 60-year scandal: ‘Belfast must be removed from its role as Lord and master’

August 9th, 2024

THERE was standing room only - and a standing ovation - at the launch of Garrett Hargan’s investigative history of the Derry university controversy,  'A Scandal in Plain Sight', at The Hive Studios in Ráth Mór.

Author Hargan, whose day-job is North West Correspondent with the Belfast Telegraph, has been to the fore in exposing how chronic regional imbalance is damaging Derry’s struggling economy.

He told the packed house: “If you remember nothing else about the book remember the question I pose on the back - how is Belfast still allowed to corral 83% of the North’s students and 95% of Higher Education capital funding? That in a nutshell is what this is about. Chronic, generational and deliberate regional inequality - and how do we identify it, stop it and reverse it.

“If Labour wants to deliver long-term growth and stability in the North, it needs to look at regional imbalance. Even the Tories recognised that in their 2021 Levelling Up report recommending a new university for Derry. Small towns without universities have received more than Derry has over the past decade including Coleraine and Ballymena who got £110m between them while Derry got just £18m for Magee.”

Garrett Hargan (pictured here with Mayor Lilian Seenoi-Barr, Conal McFeely, Kevin Hippsley and Garbhán Downey) was presented with an 'honorary doctorate' by veteran campaigner McFeely on behalf of the new, soon-to-be constituted North West University.

Hargan, whose grandfather Joe Baker marched in the original civil rights marches in Derry in the 1960s, said the blame could not be laid at the door of individual ministers. 

“If there are no checks and balances at Stormont, if ministers can run rogue departments and discriminate against a city the size of Derry for this length of time then we also have to ask: What are Foyle MLAs doing about it?  Why have they not been shouting from the rooftops?  And is Stormont fit for purpose?

“We have waited six decades too long. We’ve already lost countless young people who leave to study elsewhere and never come back. They should be contributing to an amazing city right here.  Or at the very least, have that option. And we should be able to provide a service for other young people from throughout the world who want to come and learn here.”

Hargan told the large audience, which included the Mayor, local councillors, academics and university campaigners, that the solution to the crisis could be found in the two Royal Irish Academy reports.

“I defer to academics at the Royal Irish Academy when it comes to a plan for the future.  After all, they are the specialists, the very best minds in Ireland when it comes to developing Higher Education. As Roy Keane would say, It’s their job.

“They tell us there should be an independent scrutiny committee and independent oversight.

Nobody should fear that.  There should be no reason that every party cannot commit to supporting independent oversight.  

“It exists everywhere else, why not here where there are actually historic and ongoing concerns about the inequitable distribution of funds. And it is great to see this initiative has already been unanimously backed by our local Council - including by people in this room. 

“The Royal Irish Academy has importantly recommended that a federal cross-border tertiary education institution be initiated involving existing campuses in the North West from Coleraine to Sligo - with Derry as the nucleus. They actually produced two separate reports on this - the second one this year with funding from the Shared Ireland Fund and the Irish Research Council. Belfast cannot manage Derry because of its competing priorities - and they warn that Derry will not achieve its potential until Belfast is removed from its current role of Lord and Master. This is a golden opportunity to reset.” 

The event was chaired by Ráth Mór General manager Kevin Hippsley, Ráth Mór General manager Kevin Hippsley, who commended Garrett Hargan for ‘his steadfast commitment’ to uncovering the truth in respect of the university throughout his career as a journalist here in the North West.

“Through his dogged persistence – he has fought through the bureaucratic quagmire, challenged the gatekeepers, the bean counters and the “computer says no” people and revealed some truly damning and incontrovertible data, shining a light on a number of inconvenient and uncomfortable truths.

“This publication succinctly collates Garret’s work and through external contributions from others, including Mr Pat McArt – one of our guest speakers today, provides a context for a

new direction in the city’s 60-year campaign for a university. Garrett of course as a reporter has proved to be a key part of this ongoing and developing story – creating a platform and vehicle for increasing transparency and promoting awareness of the issue.”

Speaking on her first official visit to Ráth Mór, Mayor Seenoi-Bar also paid tribute to Hargan’s dedication. And she stressed the necessity of developing the region’s higher education sector and correcting the chronic regional imbalance in the North.

She said: “The death of John Hume four years ago this week in 2020 reminded the world of his immense contribution to the international civil rights movement - a journey that began in a campaign for a university. He was the first chairperson of the University for Derry Group in 1963 - and it is his footsteps we are still walking in today.

“There’s a Greek proverb that states: ‘A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they shall never sit.’ And that is exactly what John did. He planted trees. Through dark times and war, and in better times and peace, he resolutely reminded us of the importance of education - and how education, more than anything, is the cornerstone of a just, healthy, happy - and multicultural and inclusive - society. The trees John planted are starting to grow. And the North West will never forget him for that.”

Garrett Hargan with Mayor Seenoi-Barr and Councillor Shaun Harkin

Guest speaker on the night was the Donegal-born former Derry Journal editor Pat McArt, described from the platform as ‘a one man cross-border institution’. He spoke about how the growth of the university sector in the South had led to massive renewal and regeneration.

He said: “When I started in Letterkenny RTC [Regional Technical College] in 1971, there were perhaps a hundred people there - today it is a university campus as big as Derry’s - if not bigger, and it is growing all the time. A university is a cornerstone of a town or city - an essential requirement for growth.

“I also take issue with Ulster University's suggestion that there are more than 5000 students at Magee. There certainly doesn’t seem to be - and university campaigners are certainly not accepting it. The only way to prove this is to establish a Universities Scrutiny Commission immediately, as recommended by the Royal Irish Academy. What are they frightened of?”

Publisher Garbhán Downey of Colmcille Press, who is also a spokesperson for the Derry University Group, commended Garrett Hargan.

He said: “Gone are the days when we can be dismissed as ‘dissenting voices’ - or ‘a couple of lunatics with a word processor’, as one critic dubbed us. 

“It is hard to conceive that lobbying for something as fundamentally essential -  as fundamentally civic - as our own university could still draw such contempt and ire.

“We are so fortunate to have a determined champion for our university here in this city in Garrett Hargan. He is, without a doubt, a rising star, an enduring star, and I have no doubt that our city and our region are so much the better for your work. Well done, Garrett, comhghairdeas leat - you have earned our deepest respect and gratitude.”

ENDS

Unearthed report shows Magee plan was buried to allow new Belfast campus the green light

AN EXTERNAL review of the University of Ulster’s operations conducted 18 years ago, which recommended the continued expansion of the Magee campus and warned against ‘overtrading’ on other campuses, has been unearthed by researchers and sent to Colmcille Press, following the publication of Garrett Hargan’s investigative history ‘A Scandal in Plain Sight’.

The full, three-volume report - which few people have ever seen - is not available from the UU website but will be made available from Colmcille Press.

It shows that in the period 1998 to 2005, Magee’s full-time student numbers grew by a massive 65%, from 1754 to 2893 – a factor singled out as ‘a key achievement’ by the Review Committee, which was chaired by the eminent academic, the late Sir Graeme Davies.

The Committee stated that ‘historical imbalances’ between campuses should continue to be addressed and priority given to student numbers and the range of courses at Magee: ‘In terms of future growth the University has firmly decided to accord priority to the further development of the Magee campus.

‘We support this strongly, not least in view of the University’s key role with other partners in the complex processes of regional economic and social regeneration.

‘...The University should continue to press the strong case for further strategic and targeted expansion at Magee, and we recommend that the DEL [Department of Education and Learning] should explore with the University how this objective might most effectively be achieved.’

A Scandal in Plain Sight - Garrett Hargan

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The long-buried review warned UU against taking on too much and trying to be ‘all things to all men’. Instead, it recommended ‘consolidation’ in Coleraine and Jordanstown, ‘modest growth’ in Belfast but ‘a renewed priority for growth’ at Magee.

It explained that there was now ‘a critical mass of disciplines’ at Magee that would provide a healthy basis for further growth.

‘We also note that there are now real prospects that the University will be able to augment its estate near Magee. 

‘The importance of a sizeable university base for the economic development of a sub-region has been well attested in numerous studies over the past quarter of a century.

‘Moreover, there is widespread support both in the University and among stakeholders in the North-West for further expansion at Magee.’

The Review Committee also backed plans for the ‘North-South’ medical school in the North West (which would take a further 15 years to open): ‘The clear evidence of this review period is that the University has both the capacity and the determination to act as a focal point for economic regeneration in Northern Ireland’s second city and the surrounding area.’

Crucially, the 2006 report was never referenced by either the university or the civil service, or indeed by anyone else, during the discussions which began in 2007-2008 towards relocating Jordanstown to Belfast.

This controversial move - which eventually saw UU open its new York Street campus in 2021 - appears to have been driven purely with a view towards profit; it was certainly not dictated by either economic demand or necessity - or by any academic justification. The outline business case in 2010 suggested that, because it was going to cost £70m-£75m to maintain Jordanstown over the next decade, if its lands were instead sold for £150m, then the university could effectively have £220m-£225m with which to build the new campus in Belfast. But of course the eventual cost to the university - and the taxpayer - has already been more than £400m. 

In 2008, the University for Derry committee met with senior UU officials to discuss its blueprint to establish a city-centre base for an expanded third-level campus in the North West - but were specifically told a city-centre build was not ‘viable’. Many aspects of this blueprint were then adopted for the new North Belfast campus.

Meanwhile, the proposal to expand Magee to 9400 full-time students, the centrepiece of Derry’s ‘One Plan’ in 2010, was dropped by the Stormont government in 2015, as neither UU nor Stormont had the capacity or resources to manage the competing Belfast and Derry priorities. And the decade 2010 to 2020 ended with yet another broken promise and no rise in Magee’s student numbers. [See main book]. 

Upon its inception in 1983-84, UU was mandated to have regular seven-year scrutiny reviews, but the 2006 one appears to have been the last. We could not find any record as to why they were discontinued.

The North’s Higher Education supervisory committee, the HE Council, also wound up at around this time, effectively removing any oversight of UU’s operational performance.

There has been no meaningful, external oversight of UU since that period. And the Royal Irish Academy has now twice called (2021 & 2024) for the establishment of a new Higher Education scrutiny committee for Northern Ireland.

Interestingly, according to the review, Magee staff numbers were 495 in 2005, as against just 579 in 2023.