OPINION: Higher education expansion in Derry must be the law of the land - Foyle MLA

It’s not hard to understand how people lose faith in politics.

Time and again, promises are made to our city and then remained unfulfilled.

Strategies are drawn up and then lie gathering dust on shelves in Stormont. Ministers give nods to regional balance in their rhetoric and then take few actions to deliver in practice.

Derry deserves better than this.

I’m bringing a new law to change the way Stormont works so that it finally delivers for Derry.

That delivery must start with expanding higher education here in the North West.

No other intervention could be more decisive in changing the fortunes of our city and reversing its decline.

Research has shown time and again how higher levels of graduates drive higher wages, encourage investment and increase productivity.

And the figures reveal the cost of our failure to invest in higher education here.

Derry City and Strabane has the fourth lowest percentage of the population with a third level education of any Council area at 29.6% just as Donegal boasts the fifth lowest percentage of any Local Authority in the South at 33.4%.

There is a direct correlation between this low share of graduates and the high rates of unemployment on both sides of the border.

While Derry has the highest rate of unemployment of any Council district, Donegal has the second highest of any Local Authority in the South. And the figures are stark when it comes to levels of disposable income.

The Derry and Strabane Council area has the lowest disposable income of any Council area at £15,470 while Donegal has the lowest disposable income per head of population of any Country in the South at £18,579.

In other words, the failure of government to invest here is failing not just the people of Derry but is suffocating our cross-border economy as well.

It is no accident that cities like Limerick and Galway with smaller populations than Derry boast five times as many students. It is a deliberate policy choice and one that our Executive has failed to take.

In 2020, Colum Eastwood MP secured the target of 10,000 students in the New Decade New Approach agreement.

Since then, there has rightly been a focus on what efforts Ulster University has taken to deliver on this target, with some welcome progress in the establishment of the Graduate Entry Medical School.

Yet while these efforts have been made, too often the Executive has shirked its own responsibilities to live up to this promise.

Too often, the Minister for the Economy has pointed to the half-hearted nods in their Department’s strategies as evidence of action.

Too often, the Minister for Communities has evaded any responsibility for investing in the student accommodation our city will need to make expansion a success.

Too often, the Minister of Education has used warm words when it comes to the skills pipeline that must drive investment to our region but has failed in practice.

Indeed, in some areas where the Executive has failed, the Irish government has stepped in. While Stormont has turned a blind eye, the government in the South has allocated €44.5m most recently for new facilities through the Shared Island Unit.

That’s why I am proposing this Private Member’s Bill and calling on the Executive to make it a day one priority, so that we can ensure that the expansion of higher education in Derry is the law of the land.

It is not enough for Ministers to simply point the finger at each other or insist that all responsibility lies in Derry. No more excuses. They must get it done.

Since launching this proposal, I have been heartened and grateful for the many wishes of success I have received and to those people who have told me directly that they feel such an intervention is both necessary and long overdue.

I am convinced that if this city continues to come behind our call for this law, we can change the way our economy works for the benefit of everyone here in Derry.