Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

They are great plans and sound lovely and all the rest of it, but the model of cost rental really matters and the one the Government envisages is not good enough because it leaves people subject to market fluctuations. We cannot do that immediately but there are some things we can do immediately which would help to alleviate student poverty, one of which would be to scrap the registration fees. All fees could be scrapped and the Government could cough up and make sure we get the quality training, education and skills we need for the future workforce. We need that in every area. It is way too expensive for people to do postgraduate courses. It is way too expensive for most of the cohort I referred to earlier to go to college. Apprentices have to pay fees and we are screaming out for people to move into the construction industry to retrofit homes. These sorts of exorbitant fees on training and education could immediately be scrapped, whereas the houses will take a long period of time to build, and that could contribute to them being able to afford the accommodation they need.

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