An unprecedented increase in investment in advanced scientific and technological research in Ireland was announced by the Government yesterday.
The £180 million programme, to be spent over the next three years by universities and institutes of technology, involves a "partnership" funding approach, combining direct Exchequer funding with money from private industry. It is a massive increase over current spending in this area, which has direct funding from the Department of Education and Science of only £5 million.
The chairman of the Higher Education Authority, Dr Don Thornhill, said the new programme would mean that Irish researchers would now have the chance to do "world-class research in world-class conditions". The chairman of the Conference of Irish Universities, Dr Danny O'Hare, called it "a historic breakthrough, the single most important investment in Ireland's research infrastructure since the foundation of the State".
The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, said at the programme's launch yesterday that higher education research was "absolutely crucial to attracting knowledge-based industries to Ireland".
He said in this generation Irish people were "in a position to make history - in the peace process, in assuring social inclusion, and very specially in confirming Ireland's position as a world leader in information technology and other leading-edge technologies".
The Minister for Education and Science, Mr Martin, said it was "not enough for us to exploit technologies developed in other countries. "We need to generate these technologies here, and this cannot be done without a strong culture of research in higher education. Put simply, you cannot have a cutting-edge economy without cutting-edge research."
The new programme will involve:
£75 million in Government capital spending, including tax reliefs, matched by £75 million in private sector spending to be raised by the universities and institutes of technology themselves.
£30 million in current spending, three quarters of it from the State.