Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am not satisfied about the 51-week contract situation. I intend to reach out to the local authorities this week to ask them to carry out an urgent assessment and I intend to work with the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, on legislative change in the area. This highlights the need to be less reliant on the private market and to build more college-owned student accommodation. It is the reason we are activating the building of student accommodation in DCU and Maynooth, the reason we are trying to work with UCD and Trinity to get those projects over the line and the reason we have the Higher Education Authority meeting this week with the universities, inviting them to develop proposals, send in ideas for the development of new accommodation or the refurbishment of vacant accommodation and get those proposals into us by 15 March. It is the reason we have changed our approach to student accommodation. We need to make sure we have more college-owned stock.

We are taking a number of measures on affordability. Reducing college fees this year for 96,000 students helped, as did increasing the student grants from January. Extending the renter's tax credit makes a real difference, putting €750 back in the pockets of students or their parents.

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