Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister. As he said, I was at the ploughing and was very honoured to be there when he announced this with our higher education Minister. Giving €25 million from his own budget was so important. Everybody was working together. I know Kildalton College well. My son studied horticulture there for over three years but he is now a garda. Anyway, he loved that too. It is a fabulous college. We are so lucky in the south east that it is now a university. I congratulate the Minister and everyone involved through Teagasc and SETU. They have put in all the work into this and it is game-changer for the south east. It is great to know we will have 40 places every year for veterinary students going through our area in the south east, which is excellent. If we look at the figures, we will see that over 20% of the State's agricultural output is in the south east. We have over 12,000 farms between beef, dairy, sheep and bloodstock.

That shows what a big farming sector the south east has. It is welcome and is a good news story.

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