Ms Helen Lowry:

We appreciate and acknowledge both Deputy O'Brien and Deputy McConalogue's comments that this issue requires an immediate response. We welcome the suggestion to ask the Minister to respond to the committee. I am very struck by the conversation today about funding and reform. We live in the real world too and we are not asking for anything extra for these young people. In our view, there is a sufficient number of young people to warrant an immediate response. These are the children of our first generation of immigrants. If they do not go on to third level education, if Tatiana and others are unable to finish their qualifications or even go to third level in the first place, it will have significant repercussions for our society and for our economy. Tatiana is one of many - we are working with a total of 140 families on this issue. Overwhelmingly, the young people we work with are represented in biomedical technology, in information technology, the sciences and medicine. These are knowledge-economy subjects which are very important for our economic recovery. From the perspective of integration and social cohesion, these young people are our future. This has been highlighted in the conversation in the committee about education reform. We are quite concerned about the repercussions at this stage, ten to 12 years after the first wave of immigration. These young people live here and their homes are here. They did not come here to study and work, they came to join their parents, but they want to study and work. Young people now in secondary school are very concerned about this situation. We understand this is a matter within the remit of the Department of Justice and Equality and we intend to raise the issues with that Department. However, the difficulty of obtaining citizenship when aged between 14 and 25, impacts significantly on the young people. Universities have needed to set up interim arrangements for the past ten years. The measure they have decided upon is an EU fees category, which is an anomaly because they are not EU young people. However, they may not have been born in Ireland but they are Irish now. The fees are still treble those paid by Irish students. We are very concerned about the scenario faced by Tatiana. We know of many similar cases where young people cannot reverse their fee status. We need to discuss this with the Higher Education Authority in the context of equality of access.

Our schools are very diverse but this issue does not affect hundreds or even tens of thousands of families. There has been a reform of immigration regulations. Young people are gaining citizenship. If citizenship is granted to a parent then a child under 18 years of age is automatically granted citizenship. The problem is with the timed-out issue, if a young person has just turned 18 years. This is a current problem in society.