Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Question 4: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the changes he is examining in the assessment as opposed to the administration of student grants; and if he will consider the introduction of an additional category of near adjacent rate. [9931/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The Deputy will be aware that the student grant measures announced in budget 2011 by the previous Fianna Fáil-Green Party Government began to come into effect from January this year when a reduction of 4% in the rates of grant was applied to all student grant recipients. Further to this, budget measures that will come into effect from next September for the 2011 to 2012 academic year will change the assessment of the qualifying distance criterion for the non-adjacent rate of grant, from 24 kilometres to 45 kilometres, and mature students will no longer have an automatic entitlement to the non-adjacent rate of grant.

The Deputy will appreciate that given current economic circumstances I regret that I am not in a position to reverse the changes made to the qualifying distance criteria or to introduce another adjacent rate of grant category into the student grant schemes. As a matter of routine, my Department prepares policy proposals on the student grant schemes each year. For the coming academic year, these will include the budgetary measures I have alluded to already and the annual review of the reckonable income limits contained in the schemes. This year, a more fundamental review is also being undertaken in order to consolidate the four existing student grant schemes into a single unified scheme as part of my Department's overall student grants reform programme.

Student grant schemes have a fundamental role to play in ensuring equality of access to higher education and our scarce resources should be targeted towards those most in need of assistance. The introduction of further reforms, including improvements to the way in which assessments are carried out, will be facilitated by consolidation of the administration function in a single grant awarding authority, which is due to take place from 2012.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for his reply. Will he indicate when the scheme for the next academic year will be published? Generally, it is published in May or June, but the earlier the better, as I know from my own experience as a Deputy. The Minister referred to the budgetary parameters within which he works and the parcel of money that is allocated for the higher education grant scheme. Having spoken to students and USI officials, I know that they are anxious for the Minister to review the new arrangements concerning adjacent and non-adjacent rates. They made the valid point that there should be a graduated scheme, perhaps involving another type of non-adjacent rate and a near-adjacent rate. There should be some graduation in it because it will be a fairly blunt instrument when the new arrangements come into place due to the monetary pressures involved. Those pressures are severe because of the 60% increase in participation in higher education in less than a decade, which is welcome nonetheless. Many of those currently participating in higher education come from homes where incomes are quite low. The Minister should consider ameliorating the proposal as outlined in budget 2011.

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I thank the Deputy for his comments and questions. At this point, I am not in a position to indicate when a revised or changed scheme will come into effect for the academic year 2012-13. I will examine the Deputy's proposal but he will understand that any such proposal will have to be cost-neutral within the operation of the scheme. If we can make the scheme better, however, then I am open to suggestions.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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The information may not be readily available now but can the Minister let me know as soon as possible when the scheme for 2011-12 will be published? I know from experience that the earlier it comes out the better in order to facilitate students and their parents. The Minister proposes to carry out a fundamental review of the entire student support grant scheme. When does he expect to have that review completed? According to comments attributed to the Minister in a radio interview, he indicated his concern that the scheme seemed to operate a bias in favour of farming families and self-employed persons. That view has created some concern, therefore, I would like him to deal with that issue and allay the concerns of such people in the community.

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The Deputy has raised a few supplementary questions and I will try to deal with them quickly. As regards the scheme that will come into effect for September, I will try to have it published as soon as possible. I will communicate directly with the Deputy in that regard.

With regard to the modernisation of the grant system generally, progress has been made in that the administration of the student grant will now be done by one body and it will be streamlined. We hope therefore that the frustration felt by many students due to delays in obtaining grants will be reduced or eliminated. In that case, they will get their money much more quickly than has been the case in the past.

With regard to means-testing, yes, I have made such comments. This criticism goes back a long time. However, I met with representatives of the ICMSA when they had an open-day presentation in Buswells Hotel and discussed the matter with them informally. They assured me that in modern terms, because of changes in agriculture with which the Deputy will be more familiar than myself, the accounts are more up to date, transparent and readily accessible than was perhaps the case in the past. That is all to the good and it will mean that people who are entitled to get grants and other support will do so on the basis not so much of merit but of income. In the past, there were real fears concerning the manipulation by self-employed people - whatever their activity happened to be - of their accounts in a way that a PAYE worker could not do. Hopefully, the new system will avoid that difficulty, which is a legacy from the past.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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With regard to the establishment of a new central processing agency, we should put on record our appreciation of the work of local authority and VEC officials over the years in assisting many families to draw down their due entitlements.