John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

-----but at the moment there is no cost to the taxpayer because private business covers these costs.

I am sure we will wrap up soon so I want to acknowledge the international education mark, IEM, contained in the Bill. That is long overdue and I welcome it. I welcome the attempts to strengthen learner protection measures.

The Minister of State is saying the amendment would weaken the fund and that is where the colleges come in, as Deputy Jan O'Sullivan said. The Minister of State sees it as weakening the fund and the colleges see it as akin to double taxation. The Government is now forcing the colleges to participate in something that is essentially another form of tax. They are already insuring their students and now they have to contribute to a central fund.

I also welcome the fact that QQI will have the authority to list awarding bodies, giving additional statutory powers to investigate these colleges and make sure they are running properly. The legislation will strengthen and improve QQI's approval process for providers and quality assurance procedures and all that is really necessary. I am not sure whether all this has been teased out completely to my satisfaction but I see that we are probably moving to the point of exhausting discussion on it.

See this speech in context