Both positions had become vacant following the retirement of previous Governing Authority members. Professor Guiry will take up the professorial post left vacant by the retirement of Professor Maurice Boland of the UCD Institute of Food and Health, while Coogan – an Access Coordinator at the Adult Education Centre – succeeds Mary Buckley.

Professor Guiry expressed his satisfaction with the election result, saying he “very much appreciated the opportunity this afforded me to discuss a range of issues with my colleagues, and I look forward to keeping in contact with them in the future.”

In seeking support for the election, Professor Guiry explained that he had spent time emailing, phoning, and meeting with fellow professors explaining his reasons for running and requesting their support.

Coogan told The University Observer she had experience with many committees – albeit “none as big as this one” – but that she is confident that her connections and history within the university will help ensure that the democratic sphere of the University continues into the future.

When asked about what particular developments she would like to see brought about, Coogan said she “would like to see widening participation and matters of equality moved further up the agenda.  We should be thinking in terms of knowledge as exchange and innovation in terms of public scholarship.”

Professor Guiry has worked in several similar capacities before, both within UCD and abroad, and adds that “the maintenance of high academic standards and scholarly excellence is crucial for UCD and Ireland.”

The Governing Authority is composed of 40 people and was formed in 1997, evolving out of the Governing Body established under the Charter of UCD in 1908. Its membership is comprised of professors, academic personnel, non-academic staff and members of external organisations such as the National University of Ireland. There are also four student reps on the body, including three Students’ Union reps and one postgraduate student. The current members are finishing the remainder of a five-year term ending on 31^st January 2014.

The primary duty of Governing Authority is to manage the strategic direction of the university. Its specific responsibilities include appointing and working with the President to oversee policy, monitoring the performance of the university’s management, and handling the administration of all lands and properties of the university.

IFUT, the primary trade union representing Irish academics, also notes that free resolution services are provided through the State’s Labour Relations Commission and its Labour Court.

At the report’s launch the General Secretary of IFUT, Mike Jennings, expressed his worry that the use of what he called “needlessly expensive legal teams” was a potential waste of university resources. He expressed further concern that such groups may act as potential deterrents to employees wanting to voice grievances.

Professor Gerard Casey, executive member of IFUT at UCD, has condemned the spending, saying that UCD’s current debt makes the college’s employment of IBEC “extravagant”, “pointless”, and “largely a violation of the whole [industrial relations] procedure.”

While acknowledging that the use of lawyers is justified in complex cases and in the upper levels of the legal system, Prof. Casey stated that their presence in the earlier stages of cases is the basis of this transgression and that such practices “cannot be the norm.”

The typical process of resolving human resources disputes, according to Professor Casey, is intended to be a process of conciliation and arbitration that takes place in what he described as “lawyer-free zones.” Litigants engage in a “straightforward… informal” process that results in a non-binding recommendation by the mediator. IFUT policy declares that action in higher courts should only be pursued if such conciliation fails.

Prof. Casey said that the local branch of IFUT “have indicated, informally to the universities, [that] we don’t quite understand why they’re [paying IBEC such sums]”, adding that IFUT would be contacting the university to ensure that it was dealing with industrial relations matters in an effective and sustainable manner.

A spokesperson for UCD defended the amount of money paid to IBEC, describing the services as “excellent value for money,” and said that UCD’s subscription to IBEC “gives the university unlimited access to information, representation and advice on best practice in the areas of employment, trade and international relations, taxation, and regulation.” He went on to say that IBEC “is engaged to represent the views of the university in complex industrial disputes that require expert or legal opinion which is otherwise not available.”

As the project is still in the pre-production stages, the film has yet to set a release date, and details of where and when it will start shooting are unknown as yet. Although the cast has yet to be confirmed, Irish filmmaker Lenny Abrahamson, whose work includes Garage and Adam & Paul, is already set to direct.

Power has expressed his hope that, as the book is “about a UCD story”, the decision will be made to film parts of the film on campus, but no formal announcements of filming arrangements have yet been made.

Power had not anticipated that film rights for the book would be pursued, and was surprised when Element Films approached his agent for the rights to make a big-screen edition. Power told The University Observer that the story of Bad Day in Blackrock did not seem “immediately cinematic” when he was writing it.

Power himself is not involved in writing the screenplay in any formal capacity, but has acknowledged his trust in the chosen screenwriter Malcolm Campbell who penned Shameless and Skins. He admitted that the practice of screenwriting is new to him, and that he would find it difficult to adapt his own work, “because you’re so close to the original work.”

The author is similarly untroubled about the movie’s development potentially conflicting with the success of his book, saying that “the book will still be there,” and that “there’s just so much more cultural capital in a film. It’s so much more high-profile.”

The book, which examines the aftermath of the murder of a young man outside of a Donnybrook nightclub and its reflection of upper class Irish life more generally, is Power’s first novel and will be released in the UK this July.