James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)

It is a pleasure to be with the committee today and I look forward to working with the members. I congratulate the Cathaoirleach on her appointment as chair of this very important committee and all the members who have been appointed to serve on it. I spent many years in your chair until quite recently, a Chathaoirligh, so I know just how important these engagements are. Early engagement with the Minister in the area is, hopefully, beneficial to all of us. I can understand more of the issues of interest to the members and the committee can understand more of the direction I am hoping to set. I welcome the engagement and thank the committee for the invitation.

In 1962, Lemass remarked that it is on the growth and improvement of our education system that the foundations of our future prosperity must be firmly based. We have had a track record in this nation for the last 60 years or more, starting with Lemass, Whitaker and O’Malley, whereby investment in education, research and innovation has propelled our industrial policy, economic model and subsequent prosperity. This raises all boats, including the public goods that we support and the resources that are created from that. That is very much the vein I intend to continue in this Ministry by continuing that investment in education, research and development as an economic enabler, as well as it being a public good.

Since that time, the teaching and learning, skills, research and innovation of our education system have set in motion the huge progress that we have made, both economically and socially. That has allowed us to propel forward but also, at times, to rebound and adapt following economic shocks and disruptions. No less than now, we never know what the future will hold. We are always susceptible to geopolitical tides and headwinds, which can be positive or negative. That is part of the challenge of keeping a ship on the high seas but if the ship is resourced suitably, is technologically guided and has been invested in, it sets it up for plain sailing. That is very much the direction I want to set.

In my early months at the Ministry, I have set out four clear objectives that I wish to strive for and, to an extent, they frame the work that I intend to do in conjunction with my wider team. I thank the officials who are with me today for all of their superb efforts and knowledge of the sector. The priorities I have identified are as follows: first, to foster research and innovation as an economic enabler; second, to provide high quality and highly accessible higher education; third, to expand pathways to skills, reskilling, upskilling and cross-skilling, including apprenticeships, further education and many other new and emerging pathways, through the skills ecosystem to match evolving workforce needs and prepare us for the skills of the future as well as today; and fourth, to promote curiosity and the pursuit of knowledge as a public good. Each of those is as important as the others. Collectively, they set out the vision that I hope to have the opportunity to implement over the next couple of years, working with the committee. They straddle both the economic necessity and the imperative of this brief. Along with the public good, curiosity and the pursuit of knowledge are always worth exploring in their own right because we do not know where they are going to lead. Education is beneficial in its own right, even independent of the economic dividend, and I believe it pays in spades.

Before I get into the detail, I want to reflect on the work programme that has already been achieved in the five months since I have taken on this role. With regard to the National Training Fund, we have secured a record level of investment across higher education. In April of this year, I obtained Government approval to amend the National Training Fund Act, a key step towards unlocking the potential of the funding package of €1.5 billion that exists in the National Training Fund. That is a package for the higher and further education sectors and will provide funding over a six-year period from 2025 to 2030. My officials are drafting the heads of Bill, which I hope to have approved by the Cabinet shortly, and I will then progress to bring it before the Dáil for debate.

That will be key to unlocking that really potent fund, which is long awaited and badly needed. I intend to bring that through at the earliest opportunity and I have already secured Cabinet approval to do so.

Looking at the research and innovation system, in March, I announced investment into our research infrastructure of €17.7 million. Excellent research knows no borders and is often achieved through strong international collaboration working with colleagues at home, abroad and further afield. In early May, I signed the associate membership agreement with CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, in Geneva. At 4 p.m. today, I will bring a motion before the Dáil to complete the ratification process. I have visited Geneva twice in the five months since I was appointed Minister and I was very proud to sign the membership agreement on behalf of Ireland just a few weeks ago. Pending ratification by the Dáil, the process will be completed this afternoon.

We need to keep investing in our research talent, research collaborations and research funding. Work continues on the technological university professorships, which will boost research capacity within our TUs and form part of the underlying infrastructure behind the technological universities to enable them to reach their full potential. That is a commitment in the programme for Government and I am very determined to implement it at the soonest opportunity.

I want to encourage early career researchers, from students to early post-doctoral researchers, by supporting them and offering them opportunities to experience the world of research. Initiatives such as Global Citizens 2030 and the new talent and innovation attachés in Boston and San Francisco are levers we are using to position Ireland as a world-leading destination for global research talent. My team has already taken up residence in Boston and San Francisco and will serve as ambassadors and agents to work between the Irish and American ecosystems to promote research and innovation, technology and collaboration. The intention is to despatch attachés to other key countries in the months ahead.

During this current time of economic uncertainty, research and innovation are particularly important to safeguard our competitiveness. I recently announced a package of €63.8 million to accelerate the commercialisation of research across Ireland to plug the current innovation gaps. I believe in fundamental research and curiosity but I also believe in accelerating knowledge transfer into industry and enterprise so that we can move into the product development space. Moving into a competitive space is absolutely key. That is also written large in the likes of the Draghi report and the Letta report and in almost every study that has been done recently on competitiveness. Research, development and innovation is fundamental to that offering.

On apprenticeships, lifelong learning and skills, the higher education system provides essential skills across areas of high skill demand. We have already seen significant expansion of medicine and healthcare places, with over 1,000 additional places being created since 2022. Just yesterday, Cabinet approved a proposal to add an extra 461 places across physiotherapy, occupational therapy, radiography, dietetics and many more healthcare and therapy-based disciplines. The mission for all of the Government - and I hope across all of the Oireachtas - is to tackle the disability challenge and to make sure that services are provided, including by professional service providers. We must increase our capacity. I thank my Cabinet colleagues for approving my proposal to do just that yesterday.

We must also expand our construction workforce to meet our housing, climate, and infrastructure targets. On Monday, I broke ground at the national demonstration park at Mount Lucas in Offaly. This will become a hub or centre of excellence for modern methods of construction and will be pivotal to how we do construction in the new world, using efficient modern methods to achieve more with less.

I am also excited to see the expansion of new and flexible education pathways. This includes Springboard+, microcredentials, tertiary programmes, the expansion of the student fees scheme to part-time students and much more. Curiosity drives each one of us to learn new skills and discover new knowledge. It is our responsibility to nurture everyone’s curiosity no matter their background or abilities and to support everyone in their lifelong learning journeys. We continue to expand access. Everybody has ability. We just have different types of ability. It is latent in all of us, across the population. The job of this Ministry is to tap, unlock and harness that talent and to find the right pathway to skills progression for each individual learner or student.

In April of this year, I engaged with students and stakeholders, including access officers, student union representatives and people from disadvantaged backgrounds, to discuss the cost of education. We met in Croke Park. We had a working day to consider all of the different parameters. I will publish an options paper informed by this consultation this summer.

Education should be for everyone, and there should not be barriers in anyone's way to successfully access and succeed in their education journey. I am particularly proud of the programme for access to higher education, PATH, 4, which supports students with intellectual disabilities and universal design measures in accessing higher education. That has been very successfully adopted in the system already. I have visited the Trinity College centre for learners with intellectual disabilities, Carrigaline, the Field of Dreams in Cork and other centres. I am really proud to work with those young and not-so-young people with intellectual disabilities and see the learning potential they have when they are given that opportunity. I brought a memo before Cabinet in recent weeks to support more of that work and to recognise and value it. These pathways are about unlocking our people's full potential. When everyone can succeed, we all succeed.

Affordable student accommodation is another challenge I am working on. I am aware it is a big barrier for students attending educational facilities across the country. My Department is currently working on developing a new student accommodation strategy focusing on viability and affordability. That will be published later this year. I intend to bring the first phase of that, a design module, before Cabinet for approval in the coming weeks. That will then be published and consultations will ensue. Some consultations have already taken place. It is a really important step because, if students cannot access learning close to home or cannot have a base close to their place of students, it presents them with another challenge. Having to commute long distances impedes students' time at college and their experience. That is very much a priority. Some €100 million has been sourced from the national development plan to enable the progression of a number of student accommodation developments in the immediate term. The first of these, which comprises 116 beds at Maynooth University, will be ready for the 2025-2026 academic year. There are also projects going to the boards of DCU and UCD in the near future. The goal is to activate sites that are already primed for student accommodation with a view to the longer-term strategy to bring more and more on-stream in the coming months and years.

These are only some of this year’s achievements. They are a testament to the solid foundation that we have in place. We can and will continue to aim higher and do more. Across the board, from the physicist considering the behaviour of atomic particles, perhaps in CERN, to the engineer questioning why things work the way they do, pulling levers, and the archivist studying a century-old census and wondering about the socioeconomics of the time, curiosity is the spark that ignites breakthroughs and innovation and propels us to ask why and what is next. That is very important.

As a Minister, I have a responsibility to nurture this curiosity. It stimulates innovation and economic growth but it also advances human potential. I am placing a particular emphasis on our research performance in the term ahead. This is critical if we are to maintain and enhance our global competitiveness, drive innovation and create sustainable jobs. I will prioritise research that generates high-value jobs in emerging sectors such as AI, life sciences, data sciences and renewable energy.

I was in a meeting before I came to the committee and I heard quite a challenging story. Some graduates coming out of software engineering courses are finding that their skill sets are almost antiquated before they even graduate. The pace of technology, AI and change has been so great that, from the start of a course to its end, the landscape changes. That exemplifies why we must teach our students how to think. We do not teach them the knowledge. The old rote learning is long gone. However, even with the talk and talk, we need to imbue analytical skills because knowledge is at our fingertips in our smartphones and everywhere else, enhanced through digital infrastructure, data centres and so on. We must teach our students analytical skills. That cuts across every discipline from STEM to the humanities and everything else. It is very important.

Skills are the realisation of that innovation. We need more skilled graduates to meet the demands of our economy and society, particularly in priority sectors. We need green skills, digital skills and skills in the areas of healthcare, disabilities and construction. The tertiary education sector must be agile, flexible and responsive to respond quickly to changing labour market demands and to empower people transitioning into new sectors. I want to see a higher education system that supports learners in making even more ambitious choices, a system that supports them in reskilling and upskilling throughout their life and a further expansion of flexible and inclusive routes through further and higher education. I spoke about high-quality and highly accessible further and higher education. I want to see more targeted funding for under-represented groups, including students with disabilities, mature learners, part-time students and those from disadvantaged backgrounds. It is a simple enough statement of belief that those who need more should receive more support. There is a corollary to that, which is that those who need less may be less in need of support. That is a simple, fair and progressive mantra. It is how the system has always worked. I am currently engaged in planning to secure further funding under the NDP. There are many more plans we will embark on together. I welcome the discussion. To a certain extent, I have set the scene with those opening remarks.

I look forward to hearing from committee members and taking questions.