Laura Harmon (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the witnesses for their contributions. It is very clear that they have solutions and the will to solve this. They want to take action but are being prevented from doing that because we still do not have a plan in place and the commitments in the programme for Government need to be honoured, as they rightly said. We had student unions from across the country addressing the committee last week. They would wholeheartedly agree with what the witnesses are saying today as well. I was president of the national students union ten years ago. This is an issue that is preventable and predictable and it has been exacerbating over the last decade or more. We knew technological universities were being created and mergers were happening and this should have been done sooner.

I wish to make some observations. What Professor Cusack said really stuck me in that she believes this is the number one concern for students and a critical issue of access to education. I agree with her on that. When students and families are looking at college course placements, the first thing they think of is where the students are going to live and how they are going to get there. That should not be the case. It also struck me that over 100,000 students are attending technological universities in this sector but there are only 0.4% available beds. That is outrageous to me - it is mind-boggling - and it is affecting the student experience. I live in Cork myself. My mother is a graduate of MTU and my sister is attending there. I see the congestion. I get contacted about it every day. I hear about students being left on the side of the road because there are not enough buses. Students with disabilities cannot get on the bus. People with travel passes are being left behind as well. The transport is not even able to keep up with it. We know there are waiting times for driving tests as well so even people who want to drive are being delayed. It is also affecting climate, as was rightly said. We need to have that borrowing mechanism in place and the technological universities need to be able to get on with it and not have obstructions in their way. It is very clear that there needs to be more collaboration between the Department of housing and the Department of further and higher education. There needs to be more of a cross-departmental approach and action in relation to this. It cannot be passed between different Departments and Ministers. I would be interested to hear the witnesses' views on what they would like to see done this year, as a first point on this.

Mr. McGarvey mentioned students with disabilities in the context of access to on-campus accommodation. How can we improve that access for those students? I wanted to comment in response to what Dr. Lillis said regarding the referendum in 1979 for non-NUI graduates to be able to vote in Seanad elections. As a Senator, I think it is outrageous that by the time those graduates will get the opportunity to vote it will probably be 50 years - half a century - since that referendum. They have been disenfranchised. Imagine the number of Oireachtas Members we might have seen over the last 50 years who might have been speaking up for this particular cohort. It was interesting that Mr. McGarvey mentioned that. I will leave it there if the witnesses want to reply to those questions.