Pearse Doherty (Sinn Fein)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I call on the Minister for Education and Science to ensure the proper dispersion of the student services charge by higher education institutions throughout Ireland and to guarantee all the moneys collected through the charge are invested in student services and not used to pay off institutional debt. Almost €1,000 is collected from every third level student at the beginning of each academic year. The fee is colloquially termed the student registration fee but within colleges it is entitled the student services charge.

Guidelines published by the Higher Education Authority, HEA, in the mid-1990s advise how the money should be spent. It is distributed among a variety of stakeholders, namely, the student health service, examinations and registry offices, student services such as chaplaincy, student advisory service, disability and support service, careers officer, the student's union, the societies office and sports clubs. Principles such as these are applied throughout colleges and universities.

The total net income from the charge was €10.508 million in UCD this year but only €6.676 million was spent on student support services. Unbelievably, €3.8 million was collected by the university but not spent on such services. According to its accounts, this was due to the reduction in the HEA grant allocated to universities when Deputy Noel Dempsey was Minister for Education and Science in 2002. UCD has taken a significant portion of the student services charge to cover its deficit. This practice is being carried out in bad faith as students and taxpayers are not being told clearly about it.

Money collected through the charge must be invested in much needed, under-resourced student services because students do not receive the support they need. Child care and course equipment costs as well as accommodation issues and all the other problems facing students today add to the financial burden they carry and the least that can be done with the vast sum collected under this charge is to invest it in them to give them the support they rightly deserve. Financial issues haunt students on a daily basis and too often they create a barrier to pursuing further education, especially for mature students, lower income groups and single parents. Will the Minister commit to ensure the proper dispersion of the student services charges by higher education institutions throughout the State and to guarantee all moneys collected are invested in student services and not used to pay off institutional debt?