Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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81. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he recognises the need to remove all fees for and financial barriers to further and higher education given the shortage of graduates and postgraduates across multiple sectors of Ireland’s economy and public services; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51823/22]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I have just come from UCD, where the first person I met was a lecturer who said how worried she is about the college's ability to retain and recruit PhD students because of the financial pressures they are under. I was at Trinity College for the student walkout organised by the Union of Students in Ireland the other day. I met undergraduates who were furious that effectively nothing has been done for them in the budget. I met postgraduates. This week, I met psychology students. Some are funded, some are not, and all of them said that it is nearly impossible for them to complete their studies because of the financial pressures they are under. What will the Minister do for students?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I accept that there is always a need to do more, but the idea that the Deputy suggests, or would suggest on behalf of anybody else, that nothing was done in the budget to assist students, is manifestly untrue. Some €143 million has been allocated for cost-of-living measures for students between now and the end of the year, which is not nothing. About 95,000 students will benefit from a €1,000 reduction in fees between now and Christmas. More than 50,000 students will benefit from a bonus student grant payment on 16 December, which will amount to about €679 extra for many students. Student grants will rise by between 10% and 14% from January. Students will not have to wait until the next college year. That is ahead of the inflation rate. The student assistance fund has been increased by €8 million. We have made sure that students and their parents are covered by rent relief. I accept that we need to do more, but it is certainly not nothing, or effectively nothing, as the Deputy said about the budget. That is not true.

The Deputy's question intends to inform discussion about the need to do more and what the system should look like, but we have taken many actions. I am not sure that the Deputy would be able to point to any other budget delivered in this House that has delivered more to reduce the cost of education in a single move, in the context of cost-of-living measures. I accept that there is more to do. Deputy Boyd Barrett raised a valid issue about PhD students and researchers, which is why I intend to have a full review of how this country supports our PhD students, how it compares with other countries and what we must do better. I intend for that to be an external review. It will not be a departmental exercise but will be done by somebody who can liaise directly with PhD students to look at what the country does well, what it must do better, and at the issue of financial support.

Real measures have been taken which will affect tens of thousands of students and their parents between now and Christmas. They will not have to wait for any significant period. I know that we have more to do.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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What the Government did was a drop in the ocean. It is telling that we had some of the biggest student protests for a long time after the budget. They were not happy. I am relaying what those students expressed to me. Some PhD students get no stipends. Some get miserable stipends of a few grand. Even those who get €18,000 have to work all the hours that God sends. They find it difficult to study or they have to have a second job, which makes it almost impossible for them to complete their studies. A lecturer who used to lecture me in UCD said they are worried about UCD's ability to recruit and retain postgraduate students. That is serious when we have chronic skills shortages in a number of areas across our society and public services. We are making it extremely difficult for people to get postgraduate degrees, to do doctorates and so on. That is the point. We now have increasing numbers of students saying they will just leave the country.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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We also have record numbers of students in third level education. There are more than there have ever been in the history of the State and that has to be acknowledged. There are more students than ever before in the history of the leaving certificate getting their first choice of college course. New technological universities are opening in the regions. There are pathways between further and higher education. We have abolished the post leaving certificate, PLC, course levy, increased financial supports for apprentices, and increased the PhD stipend. My record with regard to PhD students is one of increasing stipends in every year in which I have been Minister. When I first became Minister, there was a significant differential between the Irish Research Council and Science Foundation Ireland stipend. We equalised that. We are increasing those stipends by a further €500 in this budget. We are putting that €500 into the baseline. We need to do much more for PhD students. We have increased the number of postgraduate students who will be able to access the €1,000 additional contribution towards their fees this year. We made a permanent increase to the threshold in 2023. This budget has significant measures to address the cost of education, by any objective factor, but we have more to do and will build on this in the years ahead.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I still think the Minister is missing the reason they are protesting and why they are so angry. People who are on poverty stipends, who have no stipends, educational psychologists who have no funding and clinical psychologists who have a little funding are on such low incomes that they have been doubly hammered in real terms by the cost of living and the housing crisis. It is becoming unbearable for them. What they got in the budget was a drop in the ocean. It does not compensate for how much worse things have got for them over the last year and a half, particularly with the low incomes they have. I am telling the Minister that we have to get rid of the fees for postgraduate students. It makes no sense to put financial barriers in the way of people reaching their maximum potential in education. Why are we still putting up barriers, making it difficult and putting them in a situation from which many drop out or then decide to leave the country?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Objectively, we are removing barriers. I am the first Minister with responsibility for higher education who has been able to stand here in 27 years and talk about fees coming down. That is what the budget did. We can have a legitimate debate about the pace of reduction and whether we can move faster, but let us not escape the context, which is that we have just delivered a budget which has reduced college fees. It is not on a once-off basis. It has permanently reduced college fees for any household earning less than €100,000. It has done double that this year in recognition of the cost-of-living crisis. The Deputy said it does not even compensate. All of the increases or reductions that we have provided are ahead of inflation or the increased prices that students are facing. When one looks at the budget in the round, there are further additional supports. For example, there has been a 50% reduction in public transport fees for students and young people. These are real, tangible measures. We have more to do. I regularly, intensively engage with students on this issue and I listen to and hear them. There are real cost-of-education challenges in this country. This budget takes a significant step forward. We have more to do in the months and years ahead.