David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Amendment No. 37 proposes to change the word "may" to "shall". This would allow the Minister to render people from the North and Britain eligible for the student support scheme, equivalent to EU students. Our party represents people in the North and people in Britain will be concerned about what level of access they will have to educational services. Can the Minister for Education and Skills explain why the word "may" is in the Bill and not "shall"? We believe this is a reasonable and necessary amendment to ensure guaranteed access. The Minister, however, might be able to address my concerns about why it is "may". I support Deputy Funchion's amendment No. 38 too because none of us knows exactly what will happen in a hard crash and SUSI already faces challenges with queries and processing grants. For years there have been delays in processing grants. We do not want a backlog to develop because of an avalanche of queries from people in the North and Britain. It makes sense to set up a new administrative office to deal with the queries. I support amendments Nos. 37 and 38.

Not wishing to be in any way confrontational, the Ministers who have spoken previously have been very helpful - maybe not in supporting amendments - and they have accepted some amendments and the spirit of others. I could be wrong but my understanding is that the Minister will support Fianna Fáil's amendments Nos. 39 and 40 but will oppose Sinn Féin's amendments Nos. 37 and 38. I am not sure if that is an outworking of the confidence and supply agreement or some backroom deal that was done with Fianna Fáil but all amendments should be considered and supported or not on their merits. Will the Minister clarify whether it is the case that he is accepting the two Fianna Fáil amendments but does not see fit to support the equally reasonable amendments tabled by Sinn Féin?

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