Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The reality is that some of these providers will avail of some of the Covid-19 supports that are being put in place, whether that is restart grants or rate reductions from local authorities. I put it to the Minister and his colleagues in government that a clear and unambiguous message has to be sent out from the entire Government that we will not tolerate a situation where private providers are not prepared to refund students. If they cannot show that they have refunded students, then they should not be eligible for other supports.

It is clear that the softly-softly approach has not worked to date, despite numerous requests by the Minister and other Ministers. It took a lot of time to get the University of Limerick to hold up its hands and refund students. We need private providers to do the same, and we need to roll up our sleeves on this issue.

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