Details of the deal for Ramsay Centre funding won’t be released

When Uni Queensland announced negotiations for scholarship funding from the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation, the National Tertiary Education Union wanted to know what uni management was getting its members into. “There needs to be full transparency before Uni Queensland agrees to any kind of MoU with Ramsay,” the union’s branch president Andrew Bonnell said at the start of the controversy, (CMM September 14 2018).

So, when the university did not deliver documents the union FOI’d the drafts and final agreement.

Which they now have not got, at least not most of it, and will not get. Queensland’s Office of the Information Commissioner says release would be a breach of confidence.

It’s not on, according to NTEU State Secretary Michael McNally, who says the ruling “has profound implications for academic freedom and governance.”

“While the NTEU supports institutional autonomy as well as academic freedom, there needs to be transparency in institutional decision-making for the university system to function effectively,” he adds.

Bit tough, given the Information Commissioner reports the university did release documents on the Western Civ teaching and scholarships arrangement?

Not really, Uni Queensland released six pages in full, 18 in part and refused access to 859.