IRELAND’S seven university bosses have been pleading poverty on behalf of their colleges, but there’s no crisis when it comes to their own pay packets, which have more than doubled in the past eight years.

Third level participation levels are up by 25% since 1999, the Irish Universities Association told an Oireachtas committee last week. “The increase in student numbers has not been matched by a commensurate increase in investment,” it said. But what the university heads didn’t mention was that their wages were also up in the same period — by as much as 120% in some cases.

Civil service wages increased by about 53% between 2000 and 2007, and the average industrial wage went up by 56%. According to figures from the Central Statistics Office, the average banking wage went up by 49% over that seven-year period.

Meanwhile, college chiefs enjoyed a 120% pay increase, from €100,000 a year to €220,000. Eight years ago, professors earned a maximum of €65,000 but can now earn up to €143,000.

Over the same period, a senior lecturer’s maximum salary increased from €51,000 to twice that level today. In 2000, a junior lecturer started on €17,500. Nowadays, the starting rate is closer to €35,000, an increase of almost 100%.

While salary scales are not set by individual universities, they do decide how many staff to install at each grade. None of the universities contacted last week was willing to provide details.

The Higher Education Authority (HEA) sets out the salary scales for university staff, which it says accounts for about 70% of a college’s annual budget. Malcolm Byrne, a spokesman for the HEA, said: “Universities must decide themselves how they will allocate the budget — on academic staff, admin-istration and other areas.”

Byrne defended the salary levels, saying they were comparable to chief executives of similarly sized private-sector companies. “These institutions are key to the development of the country,” he said.

Under the Universities Act 1997, colleges are obliged to inform the HEA if they foresee a deficit arising. They are then obliged to put mechanisms in place for the following year.

Last week, University College Dublin reported a cumulative deficit of €15m; University College Cork said it had a cumulative deficit of €13m, along with a capital deficit in the region of €30m. The University of Limerick said it expected a deficit of €6m by the year’s end, while NUI Galway projected €5.2m this year. Dublin City University has no deficit, but has borrowed for capital projects. Trinity College Dublin also expects a deficit next year.

Byrne warned that a 3% pay-cut ordered for the university sector would increase the deficits further in some colleges and said any “significant cuts in Tuesday’s budget would have serious implications”. He said colleges had already started to let part-time staff go.

Last month, university chiefs met Batt O’Keeffe, the education minister, and warned of impending cuts in frontline student services unless they got more funding. As revealed by this newspaper last week, the government is now planning an increase in college registration fees.

The Department of Education increased student registration fees by 10% this year, but the impact of that increase did not translate into improved student services in colleges because the government clawed back 75% of the price hike. The higher education sector will go under the microscope in the coming months when O’Keeffe launches an 18-month review. Its remit will be to study third-level funding and to consider a return of fees.

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