Willie O'Dea (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)

My practice, either in this or the Lower House, is that when I say I will look at an amendment, I do so. It is not for the sake of getting rid of Members. Senator Henry made an excellent case for this amendment on Committee Stage.

I have discussed this in the interim with the Minister for Education and Science. We looked again at the issue of higher education grants and the proposed section 45 amendment in the name of Senator Henry. There is nothing in section 45 that prohibits the Minister for Education and Science from giving grants to non-nationals. Section 45 simply gives the Minister for Education and Science discretion as to whether the conditions should be restricted to EU nationals or varied between EU nationals and non-EU nationals.

The Minister for Education and Science informed me that the nationality clause in the higher education maintenance grants schemes has recently been widened. It now covers, in addition to EU nationals, refugees, those with humanitarian leave to remain in the State, the spouse of an Irish national residing in the State, the child of such a person not having EU nationality, spouses of EU nationals working here who are not EU nationals and nationals of Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. The Minister for Education and Science has shown flexibility on the question of nationality and the Senator's proposal would unfortunately remove such a discretion from the Minister, which he has exercised flexibly in the past. It would oblige the Minister to pay grants to non-EU nationals on the same basis as EU nationals subject only to a residency qualification.

If the amendment was accepted, the Minister would no longer be able to give priority to non-EU spouses of Irish and EU nationals over other non-EU nationals. The payment of higher education grants may not necessarily be a matter of the highest priority in current expenditure in the education sector. After detailed discussions with the Minister for Education and Science, eloquent though the case for the amendment was, I cannot accept it.