Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

In addition, last June the Minister announced the implementation and operation of a central online system for the administration of student grants. That implementation has been disastrous under his watch. The system is failing abysmally, as third level students throughout Ireland are yet to receive decisions, let alone the grants themselves, on their applications. The Minister has confirmed that up to 40% of applications are being returned as incomplete, which flies in the face of the scheme's raison d'être, that is, to be fail-safe. Many students must resubmit their applications and decisions have only been issued in respect of 22% of all applications. Up to 50,000 students are waiting. This is unacceptable.

These chronic delays have serious implications for students. Worryingly, there is anecdotal evidence of students dropping out of college because of a lack of certainty. We are also hearing that students cannot register properly and are being denied access to various campus services. Many students are suffering a great deal of stress and deep anxiety.

Approximately 65 staff are doing the work that up to 60 local authorities did previously. Will the Government intervene in this unprecedented crisis in the administration of student grants and get the Higher Education Authority, HEA, the City of Dublin Vocational Education Committee, CDVEC, which administers Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, which is the grants system, and the university authorities to ensure we have a student-centric approach to the crisis? Students are number one. Everyone else must work to that end, not towards their own institutional or territorial concerns. This is the critical issue. Will the Tánaiste confirm that the Minister will take charge of this fiasco? He has washed his hands of it to date.

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