Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy and join him in acknowledging the success of the SETU. I also acknowledge that he has been an enormous supporter of the university. We have gone from no university in the south east to one. We have moved from an aspiration in respect of the Waterford Crystal site to having secured it, with plans coming on for student accommodation. Whatever happens beyond this point, there have been very high-quality applications that are being seen as such not just by me or the Deputy but by independent panels that are assessing them. That is a credit to the leadership of the SETU and I acknowledge that publicly.

The Department of Health is of the view that all of the places that have been identified will be required by it in the coming years. It will be a matter for me and the Minister for Health, through the Estimates process and, more particularly, through the national development plan review process, to secure the funding and try to programmatically roll that out. The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, his officials and I have a piece of work to do on identifying how many of the veterinary places the system suggests could be provided are viewed as needed by his Department. We will then engage with the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform. I want to be in a position to be moving this forward in the autumn. I want to see additional capacity coming onstream across the disciplines in 2024. Where we are looking to establish new schools, we must be honest that it is more likely to be 2025 in reality. However, there is still room for us to see the expansion of courses in 2024.

I will say, in respect of veterinary medicine, that the HEA report refers to the importance of regional balance and regional development. That will have to be a factor. The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine and I have said that we are not ruling in or out any project in the sense that we are not saying there will only be one project because there may be more than one. We will now work with the institutions to prepare their business cases. The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine will then identify how many of the 230 additional places identified by the system it believes it will need in the coming years.