Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South-Central, Sinn Fein)

For a couple of days I really could not get my head around what the Government was at in relation to this. Was it some sort of internal politics between Departments, trying to bounce somebody into making an announcement? Was it sheer incompetence? I could not understand it. Why would the Government just walk into a problem that had not been on the horizon? Why would it create this stress and worry for parents? Then I remembered an article from a couple of weeks that I saw in the Irish Independent in which a Minister was quoted, anonymously, as saying that the budget would recognise that there is no longer a cost-of-living crisis and I thought, that is it, that explains it. That is fundamentally the issue here. There are Cabinet Ministers, I do not know who exactly, who think the cost-of-living crisis is over.

For the avoidance of any doubt, the cost-of-living crisis is far from over. It is far from over for the students in the Gallery. It is far from over for parents of students who are trying to figure things out. This is a huge decision for people, for parents trying to budget and for a lot of students who are trying to meet these costs themselves. Some are working one or two jobs trying to make sure they can pay the registration fee. This will decide whether some people have the chance to go to third level or not.

We talk about the cost-of-living crisis and to some extent it is about supermarket prices and so on but it is also about the fact that this is a State that is constantly asking people to pay twice. They pay first in their taxes and then they pay for third level, for their GP, for accident and emergency visits, for their prescriptions and for their voluntary contributions. The policy of this Government and the governments that went before it is to constantly ask people to pay twice and that is a big part of the cost-of-living crisis.

The Taoiseach talked earlier about the people who are being left behind. There are people who will, on foot of this decision, potentially be left behind. They were hoping to go to third level, to a university or a technological university, but they will not be able to now. The Government needs to reverse this decision because people are relying on it.

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