CITY TRIBUNE
College spends €18,500 on series of promotional trips to China
Trips to China cost Galway Mayo Institute of Technology more than €18,500 last year.
Seven staff of GMIT travelled to China on three separate trips in 2016, and there was one trip to Hong Kong.
A chunk of the money was spent by three staff who travelled to promote GMIT at education trade exhibitions, in the hope of attracting Chinese students to come to study at campuses in Galway and Mayo.
Four lecturers travelled at a far lesser expense to give lectures to students taking the GMIT programmes in Nanchang in China.
The total cost of the Chinese trips was €18,535, according to expenses claims forms released to Galway City Tribune under Freedom of Information.
This included €8,659 for travel and subsistence claims; and the total cost of flights was an additional €9,876.
Two members of staff spent a fortnight in China from October 18 to 31 last year, incurring expenses of €2,635 and €2,658.75 respectively, which did not include flights.
They attended the China Ireland Education Summit, as well as visiting Wuhan, Beijing, Shanghai, to meet with new potential partners and to discuss potential collaborations.
One member of staff at GMIT spent five days in Hong Kong last July, attending an “international education exhibition”.
Some €983.19 was claimed in expenses, not including flights. An estimate of €2,200 for ‘conference fees’ was included in the travel and subsistence prior authorisation form, which is submitted prior to travel.
Four staff members from the Galway college travelled to Nanchang in China, and gave lectures at the local college, which has links with GMIT.
The expenses incurred as a result of those trips in May and November included: €983.19, €627.88, €627.88, €340.08, and €786.06, all excluding flight costs.
GMIT, following a separate FOI request, provided details of the cost of flights for the above trips, which was paid by the college in addition to the travel and subsistence.
The flights for each trip was as follows: Beijing (€1,375), Hong Kong (€1,583), Nanchang (€1,090), Nanchang (€1,015), Beijing and Shanghai (€1,236), Nanchang (€1,278), Nanchang (€1,015) and Beijing (€1,284).
In a statement, GMIT declined to say whether its relationship with the university in Nanchang is continuing this year.
“Due to the confidential nature of all our agreements with partner universities we cannot divulge particulars in relation to any one partnership, albeit we can confirm that GMIT has had a longstanding partnership with Nanchang University in the Peoples Republic of China. This agreement was supported inter alia, by a number of GMIT academic and administration staff visits in recent years.
“GMIT is always eager to build new strategic partnerships while maintaining relations with existing partners. During a senior ministerial-led education mission to China in October 2016, two new partnerships were formed with Wuhan University and Hubei University for Nationalities. All agreements are signed to solidify our internationalisation objectives and to support GMIT’s Strategic Plan,” it said.
In relation to the trips to China generally, the college added: “GMIT evaluates its international partnerships over an extended period of time as opposed to in-depth analysis of specific individual visits. Experience in managing international collaborations teaches that you cannot evaluate trips in isolation. Developing and managing partnerships in Asia is a slow and complex process.
“Consequently, we work very closely with Education in Ireland and other in-market advisers to ensure we maximise our resources in a way that gives us the best chances of a return on our investment.”
GMIT had a deficit of about €2 million in 2015.
From the Galway City Tribune – An impassioned plea for a ‘masterplan’ that would guide Galway City into the future has been made in the Dáil. Galway West TD Catherine Connolly stated this week that there needed to be an all-inclusive approach with “vision and leadership” in order to build a sustainable city.
Deputy Connolly spoke at length at the crisis surrounding traffic and housing in Galway city and said that not all of the blame could be laid at the door of the local authority.
She said that her preference would be the provision of light rail as the main form of public transport, but that this would have to be driven by the government.
“I sat on the local council for 17 years and despaired at all of the solutions going down one road, metaphorically and literally. In 2005 we put Park & Ride into the development plan, but that has not been rolled out. A 2016 transport strategy was outdated at the time and still has not been updated.
“Due to the housing crisis in the city, a task force was set up in 2019. Not a single report or analysis has been published on the cause of the crisis,” added Deputy Connolly.
She then referred to a report from the Land Development Agency (LDA) that identified lands suitable for the provision of housing. But she said that two-thirds of these had significant problems and a large portion was in Merlin Park University Hospital which, she said, would never have housing built on it.
In response, Minister Simon Harris spoke of the continuing job investment in the city and also in higher education, which is his portfolio.
But turning his attention to traffic congestion, he accepted that there were “real issues” when it came to transport, mobility and accessibility around Galway.
“We share the view that we need a Park & Ride facility and I understand there are also Bus Connects plans.
“I also suggest that the City Council reflect on her comments. I am proud to be in a Government that is providing unparalleled levels of investment to local authorities and unparalleled opportunities for local authorities to draw down,” he said.
Then Minister Harris referred to the controversial Galway City Outer Ring Road which he said was “struck down by An Bord Pleanála”, despite a lot of energy having been put into that project.
However, Deputy Connolly picked up on this and pointed out that An Bord Pleanála did not say ‘No’ to the ring road.
“The High Court said ‘No’ to the ring road because An Bord Pleanála acknowledged it failed utterly to consider climate change and our climate change obligations.
“That tells us something about An Bord Pleanála and the management that submitted such a plan.”
In the end, Minister Harris agreed that there needed to be a masterplan for Galway City.
“I suggest it is for the local authority to come up with a vision and then work with the Government to try to fund and implement that.”
The new Salmon Weir pedestrian and cycle bridge will be officially opened to the public next Friday, May 26.
Work on the €10 million bridge got underway in April 2022, before the main structure was hoisted into place in early December.
A lunchtime tape-cutting ceremony will take place on Friday, as the first pedestrians and cyclists traverse the as-yet-unnamed bridge.
The Chief Executive of Galway City Council, Brendan McGrath, previously said the bridge, once opened, would remove existing conflicts between pedestrians, cyclists and traffic “as well as facilitating the Cross-City Link public transport corridor over the existing 200-year-old bridge”.
The naming of the new bridge has been under discussion by the Council’s Civic Commemorations Committee since late last year.
One name that has been in the mix for some time is that of the first woman in Europe to graduate with an engineering degree – Alice Perry.
Ms Perry, who was from Wellpark, graduated from Queen’s College Galway (now University of Galway) in 1906. The university’s engineering building is named in her honour.
The bridge was built by Jons Civil Engineering firm in County Meath and was assembled off-site before being transported to Galway. Funding for the project was provided in full by the National Transport Authority and the European Regional Development Fund.
(Photo: Sheila Gallagher captured the city’s new pedestrian footbridge being raised on the south side of the Salmon Weir Bridge in December. It will officially open next Friday, May 26).
From the Galway City Tribune – Minister of State for Local Government and Planning, Kieran O’Donnell was labelled a “disgrace” for overturning councillors’ decisions to rezone land in the new City Development Plan.
Minister O’Donnell (pictured) confirmed in a letter to Council Chief Executive Brendan McGrath last week that he was reversing 25 material alternations made by councillors to the CDP 2023-29. He made the decision on the advice of Office of Planning Regulator (OPR).
Minister O’Donnell directed that 14 land parcels that were subject to land-use zoning changes by councillors as part of the Material Alterations to the Draft CDP should be reversed.
He directed that a further 11 land parcels in the city should become “unzoned”.
The Minister found that the CDP had not been made in a manner consistent with recommendations of the OPR, which required specific changes to the plan to ensure consistency with the national planning laws and guidelines.
At last week’s Council meeting Cllr Eddie Hoare (FG) asked for clarity on the process by which councillors could rezone the lands that had been changed by the Minister’s direction.
Cllr Declan McDonnell said, “What he [Minister O’Donnell] has done is an absolute disgrace”.
And he asked: “Do we have to have another development plan meeting to deal with it?”
Both Cllrs Hoare and McDonnell wondered what would become of the lands that were rezoned or unzoned by the ministerial direction.
Mr McGrath said the Council had put forward an argument in favour of retaining the material alterations in the plan, but ultimately the Minister sided with OPR.
He said if councillors want to make alterations to the new plan, they could go through the process of making a material alteration but this was lengthy.
The Save Roscam Peninsula campaign welcomed the Minister’s decision.
In a statement to the Galway City Tribune, it said the direction would mean the Roscam village area on the Roscam Peninsula will be unzoned and a number of land parcels would revert back to agriculture/high amenity.
A spokesperson for the campaign said: “the material alterations made by city councillors following lobbying by developers continued the long-standing practice of councillors facilitating a developer-led plan rather than an evidence- and policy-based plan that meets the needs of the city.
“The Minister’s direction is an important step in restoring confidence in the planning system. It is clear from the City Council’s own evidence on future housing projections that there was no requirement to zone these lands for residential purposes in order to meet the needs of the targeted population increase up to 2029,” the spokesperson added.
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