Liam Quaide (Cork East, Social Democrats)

I thank the Minister for his statement on the power of higher education, research and skills as economic enablers. This is a noble and important subject for us to consider. I will briefly recall an era when higher education was much better set up to develop the whole person who was passing through this important, exciting and memorable stage of his or her life. I first went to college in 1997. Third level fees had recently been abolished, opening up university and college life to many more young people than was previously the case. Rents in Cork were generally affordable at the time, even if the standard of accommodation varied from the acceptable to the Dickensian. Young people across society had the capacity to enjoy a full college life, to separate from their family of origin and branch out into the world. They were living away from home for the first time and becoming immersed in the multifaceted swirl of college life. Most importantly, there was a much greater capacity to make mistakes on this part of life's journey, to repeat a year in college if you had to and get back on track thereafter. There was also more freedom to pursue a course for the love of literature, language or philosophy, as opposed to being solely focused on a career and economic achievement.

It was not a perfect time. There remained major barriers to third level education for working class young people and people from the Travelling community. Today, however, vast numbers of young people are forced by the cost of housing, in particular, to live at home and commute long distances to college. Many young people who struggle psychologically with the transition to third level are unable to sustain their courses due to the financial pressures involved in deferring or repeating exams. In many ways, young people today across society are being deprived of an enriched college experience by the extreme costs of living to which they are subject. We owe it to young people to resolve the housing crisis, which is at the core of the disparity between college life now and college life 25 or 30 years ago. We can only do that with the radical departure in housing policy that is required.

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