Tamworth university: clause to rule out competition scratched in MOU with Tamworth Regional Council

Tamworth Regional Council (TRC) will throw open the doors to publicly-owned premises at a peppercorn price under the two-year deal.

While it's not a legally binding document, it does carry weight, councillor Glenn Inglis said.

"There's an exclusivity clause in there and that just bothers me from the aspect of being lawful," he said.

"Whenever you have an exclusivity clause we need to give that very thoughtful consideration, and that's in relation to the provision of tertiary education and research services because in Australia that operates in an open access marketplace.

"It is highly likely as has already been evidenced by a whole stack of arrangements in Tamworth that situations will arise whereby a preferred supplier of education, particularly in the research side of life, may need to be from a different provider.

"Agreements that prohibit competition can be unlawful."

The MOU falls somewhere between a handshake deal and a written contract.

A change was made to the MOU for the mayor to have discussions with UNE to make sure that clause won't prohibit competition in the city.

The satellite sites will be offered to UNE until a deal can be worked out with the federal government to chip-in $10 million for a physical campus.

Mayor Col Murray said the bugbear there is that the federal government argues education infrastructure is a state responsibility.

"Generally the federal government doesn't fund university infrastructure, they fund the education and supply the money for funded places," he said.

Classes could be run out of "underutilised" facilities like the Sports Dome, Australian Equine and Livestock Events Centre, the former BAE flying college and land the council is developing in the industrial estate.

The council will develop a joint scholarship fund, establish English Language Training for the immigrant workforce and promote joint research opportunities.

It all brings the city one step closer to a highly-skilled workforce, TRC growth and prosperity director Jaqueline O'Neill said.

"What we see is youth leaving Tamworth and the region to attend university in other areas, when those youth leave only about 20 per cent of them come back," she said.

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"What we would like to see is for those youth to stay in Tamworth and our region, when that happens it means we can apply skilled labour and we have a better workforce.

"A skilled workforce creates innovation, creativity, increases productivity and this is great for business."

The council and the university will work together on new programs and initiatives to advance the city's Blueprint 100 and UNE's Future Fit Strategy.

In two years the MOU will be revisited.

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