Fintan Warfield (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It will come as no surprise to the Minister of State to hear me say that I believe in a publicly-funded model of third level education and moving towards the complete removal of fees. Universities and colleges have been underfunded for over a decade, forcing them to find money in the private sector or to charge international students huge fees.

I have been contacted by students, as I am sure the Minister of State has been, who feel they have been scammed, quite frankly. They say their fees are completely unjustifiable because key elements of their courses are not taking place. One woman said that class sizes have doubled due to online learning and there is reduced support from lecturers as a result. She says it is double the money for the university, but half the attention for the students. Another student said there have been no laboratory classes for many courses in science, which are the most costly part of these courses for the university. Students say that, typically, science courses cost €2,000 more because of this. Another student said that students are unable to find part-time work, which is a major issue for international students who moved here in September and whose fees are significantly higher at approximately €25,000. On top of that, they are paying Dublin's sky high rents.

The grant of €250 given by the Government to almost every student recently must be seen in the context of the increase in fees for courses, thus offsetting those increases in some way, and where some students will have to complete another semester next year to pass their courses by completing placements and so forth. In that context, €250 is not a meaningful reduction in fees. University College Dublin business school students have asked for a 30% reduction in fees and approximately one third of the graduate medicine students at UCD withheld their fees and have asked that next year's fees be frozen or reduced. I commend them on that.I will say it again. Ultimately, the new Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science in which the Minister of State is involved should be the launch pad to building a truly publicly funded third level model of education. We need to share that burden across our society. Students and their families cannot shoulder that burden or that cost alone. My question, therefore, is this: will the Minister of State engage with universities to ensure that our future doctors, social workers, scientists and teachers are charged a fair amount for what they are getting this year and what they may be required to do next year?