James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)

An Teachta Heneghan spoke about student accommodation and backyard cabins and such like. Regardless of whether I comment on my own brief, it would probably be unhelpful if I were to start commenting on the Minister for housing's brief. I hear what the Deputy is saying, and I will mention those points to the Minister. I am not across that section so it would not be appropriate for me to get into commentary on it. However, the Deputy highlights a point that ultimately the costs of education are multifaceted. There are fees, living costs, accommodation costs, transport costs and materials costs. We have been through this a few times in the House, but I will recap. One of the many ways that I hope to tackle the cost of education is by producing a cost of education paper. I met with students’ representatives in April in Croke Park.

I met the USI in March, again in April and again in June. I met many other representatives across the education system, including access officers and advocates for disadvantaged groups. From that stakeholder engagement, which is ongoing and on which I am open to submissions, I published a costs of education paper that sets out the choices. There are choices and costs but they are not just financial costs; there are opportunity costs. If we do this, we cannot do that. Those are the choices we have to make.

Among them are choices about student accommodation. I brought to Cabinet a fortnight ago a blueprint for student accommodation. I want to publish by the end of this year a student accommodation strategy. Ultimately, the solution to finding comfortable, affordable units for students is building student accommodation at scale. We have 116 beds coming on stream in Maynooth and 493 recently announced by UCD with support and funding from my Department. DCU is in a process before its board investigating its tenders. Those are the first three projects coming on stream in the near future. We have many other projects around the country. I am seeking significant funding in the national development plan to invest further in purpose-built student accommodation.

The Deputy mentioned people travelling further having a greater burden. In the SUSI scheme, there is the adjacent grant and the non-adjacent grant. Those who live further from their college qualify for a higher maintenance grant, as is right and proper because it costs more to get there.

Deputy O'Hara talked of a family in his constituency. I am happy to take that discussion offline. If he brings me that case, I will investigate it. That goes for any Deputy in the House if there are particular cases they are struggling with. Let us see whether, with the supports and schemes already in place, some people are falling through the cracks. If so, why? If not, great, let us get them the support they are entitled to. There may be a flaw that means they are not getting support. I hear a lot of hardship cases. I hear them in my constituency and have for years, long before I was in this Department. Now I am in a position to do something about it. If Deputies find gaps in the system or anomalies, tell me so I can fix them.

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