Mr. Paul Lemass:

We absolutely recognise there is a shortfall in accommodation. That is why the Department is getting involved. That is why we put €100 million in so far, with, hopefully more to come through an NDP outcome. The establishment of technological universities was very much meant to bring education closer to where the learner is. The idea we now have five technological universities, four of which are outside of Dublin and many on multiple campuses, means the capacity to attend when living at home has increased for those attending technological universities. We absolutely recognise there is a gap, and an affordability challenge as well. I will revert to the Senator regarding inspections. My understanding is it falls to the operator to inspect the properties. Regarding change of use, the current planning provisions are such that one would have to apply for purpose-built student accommodation and apply for a change of use were one to wish to change it from that. Heretofore, the designation of purpose-built student accommodation was not quite as rigid and, therefore, people were able to take student accommodation and use it for other purposes but planning changes have addressed that looking forward to new developments. The Senator's point is well made: there are existing developments, such as the one Deputy Feighan talked about earlier, where things have been taken out of the student market. We do work with colleagues in the Department of children. We have a protocol with them. We have asked that anything they would contract for service would be vacant for a period of at least a year. The purpose of that was to demonstrate there was not a demand there. Ultimately, we cannot prevent a private owner of a property doing what they will with it, but we have agreed with the Department of children, now the Department of justice, that they would not contract where there was a student occupancy or it had not been vacant for at least a year.