Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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86. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the steps that are being taken by his Department to assist young people in aftercare, that is persons who have left Tusla residential or foster care placements at the age of 18 years, who are in further or higher education; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51338/22]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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Children or teenagers in State care are sometimes very vulnerable people with complex and sometimes very difficult experiences.

It is vital the Government seeks to assist them as they progress through what is referred to as aftercare, which is a period immediately after they leave foster care placements or residential care. What is the Department doing to assist people with aftercare?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for his question; it is one of the most important with which we will deal this evening and I will genuinely work with him on this issue. We have had a number of meetings with Empowering People In Care, EPIC. Marissa Ryan, its CEO, is doing great work and Rory Brown, a member of its youth council, recently spoke at the launch of the new national access plan. Before I get into my formal answer, I make the point that we have agreed to include exactly the type of students to whom the Deputy is referring as a priority cohort group in the new national access plan. For the first time, they are identified as a priority group. That is important because what we put in the plan as a priority group gets measured. Ultimately, targets get set and data get generated. It also enables the group to begin to access funding for people leaving aftercare trying to access higher education in terms of the various schemes we have in place.

It is evident from the consultations we have had that those leaving the care system represent an important group whose life experiences and situations merit additional support in accessing and participating in further and higher education. With that in mind, the new national access plan, which I launched in late August, for the first time identifies people with experience of the care system as one of the priority groups for action under the plan. The plan sets a high level of ambition for the higher education system in supporting access, participation and success among groups identified as priority groups. It aims to support inclusion and diversity in the student body. Delivery of the plan is supported by the programme for access to higher education, PATH, which provides a range of supports, including financial supports, to priority groups. The supports include access to bursaries and scholarship schemes and support for people from target groups in accessing initial teacher education. There are other strands to the PATH programme and, in the interest of time, I will send the Deputy a note on those aspects.

In working to address the issues of people with experience of the care system, I acknowledge, as they have asked me to do, that there is a lot more work that needs to be done to develop better data on care leavers and their path through higher education. The first priority will be to establish new baseline data for these learners and then, from that, develop specific targets in terms of increased participation. We will be working to develop better data in this area to help us understand what targeted interventions look like.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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I welcome that this group will be considered a priority group and that there will be proposed analysis of their pathway through third level, etc. Subject to assessment, care leavers are entitled to aftercare from the age of 18, when their foster or residential placements end, until the age of 21. Aftercare supports can be extended to the age of 23 if the young person goes to further or higher education. The Minister will agree that is discriminatory and unfair. All young people, regardless of the path they take in life, be it an apprenticeship or going straight into the world of work, should be granted supports for an equal length of time on leaving care. Aftercare should be placed on a statutory footing for all young people leaving care and there should not be a barrier for those who are not in further education from the age of 21. I am not sure what role the Minister's Department can play in that aspect in terms of the drafting of rules but if it is in his power to reform that system, I ask him to so do. It is a big issue for my party - Ógra Aontú, our youth section, is passionate about it - and I ask the Minister to look into it.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I appreciate and acknowledge the passion. It is a serious issue and we will look into it. As the Deputy implied, it is not directly within the remit of my Department. The benefit of the national access plan, however, is that it involves other Departments on the implementation group. The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, the Department of Health, the Department of Social Welfare and the likes play a role in the oversight and implementation of the plan, as do stakeholders and people with lived experiences in terms of the priority groups. I am happy to send the Deputy a note on the matter.

When my officials and I met with EPIC on a number of occasions to discuss several of these issues relating to the emerging challenges that students who have experience of the care system encounter, we discussed 12 items, including the need for wrap-around supports, data collection, career guidance into higher education, specific focus on retention, streamlining of the SUSI supports, the need for more flexibility, therapeutic supports in some cases, role models to spread positivity around the system and the issue of trust being key in the context of the relationship with access officers. I accept that we have a big body of work to do here. Naming these young people as a priority group genuinely brings a focus and a reporting mechanism that has been lacking to date.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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I, too, recognise the great work done by EPIC. According to EUROSTAT figures, 80% of people aged between 16 and 29 in this country are still living at home with their parents. In every town and village in the country, young adults are living with their parents due to the crisis-of-living crisis and other spiralling pressures such as rents. The age of 18 is very young for a person to leave home. Many of those who do so often feel anxious and return to the family home at weekends or, at least, can phone their parents to look for financial or other assistance. Obviously, most young people return to their family homes at Christmas, for example. For an 18-year-old in foster care, the State placement ends on the person's 18th birthday and aftercare supports can end for many of those people as well. It is important that we go further and look to potentially extend foster care from the age of 18 to the age of 21. Would the Minister agree to that proposal?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I do not want to stray too far outside my remit as I do not have responsibility for that matter but I will be engaging with relevant Departments and Government colleagues on these issues. If we are serious about fixing access to further and higher education for people who have had experience of the care system - and we are - that will be interdependent on several other things happening across a range of Departments. I will certainly engage with colleagues and I am happy to engage further with the Deputy.

He is right to say young persons experience a moment of major transition from second level education into third level. It is a big moment in anybody's life. It is very different, however, to the quite serious cliff edge that a person leaving foster care immediately encounters. We all probably have a sense of that. Since my engagement with people who have had direct experience of the care system, I have a much better sense of it than I did previously. It has made us determined to try to support these students. There are a number of things on which we can try to move pretty quickly in terms of the access offices, flexibility around the student assistance fund, SAF, and examining the SUSI grant system. I am happy to have a further meeting or engagement with the Deputy on this matter.