Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 12 November 2014

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Education and Social Protection

Further Education and Training Strategy: Discussion

2:35 pm

Photo of Jim D'ArcyJim D'Arcy (Fine Gael)
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I apologise for being late, but we were dealing with the Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, a part of which relates to the grant system for further education and its management by SOLAS.

I have two questions, the first of which is for SOLAS. That five education and training boards, ETBs, did not initially have training centres caused problems in some places. Has the situation been resolved and, if so, how?

My second question is for Mr. Moriarty, whom I last met at the final meeting of Louth VEC, of which I was a member, before it closed down. I have spoken with him since on the telephone. Are all of the ETBs up and running? Will we get the list of their members? Will Mr. Moriarty ask them to put information on their websites? The current amount of information on their memberships and so on is scant. For reasons of transparency, etc., it would be useful to have it.

Is the cost of €200 prohibitive for some people? Some categories of people cannot receive grants, for example, a single mother who is designated as living at home but who has a family of her own. She might be estranged from her home, but she has one. Have our guests encountered this problem?