Laura Harmon (Labour)
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I welcome the Minister of State. I would like clarity on the issue of student fees and supports. I was president of the national students' union, USI, ten years ago. Student fees, the cost of living, student housing and access to education were all issues then and are more prominent now than ever. It needs to be a priority for this Government. It is dismaying and alarming that the Minister for further and higher education, Deputy Lawless, went on the airwaves a couple of weeks ago and announced that there would be an increase in student fees of potentially €1,000 this September. There was previously a decrease in the fee but the decrease rowback is an increase. We have to call it out for what it is. What will the fee be for students going to college this September?

There has been a huge amount of miscommunication and a lack of clarity from the Government to students and their families. The Minister said one thing, while one of his colleagues in Fine Gael took to another radio show saying a different thing. In this Chamber, eight Fine Gael Senators consecutively said they disagreed with the Minister. They are in a Government party. We need clarity on what is happening. The people suffering are students and their families. They have been disrespected by this Government.

We need a plan for families. They need to be able to budget. The cost of living, rent and fuel costs are all rising. The cost of living is going up, not down, so I cannot see the justification for any change upwards in student fees. The programme for Government just six months ago committed to reducing the contribution fee over the lifetime of this Government. Increasing it is a poor start. I do not know how the Government will honour that commitment. It would be good to see a plan. To put it in context, the average rent in Cork city in €2,200 per month. UCC students' union in a survey last year found that 28% of students in UCC had gone to class hungry because of the cost of living. Student poverty is a real issue. We need more publicly owned student accommodation that is affordable. We are still waiting on the student accommodation strategy. We were told it would be ready before the summer and then that it would be the third quarter of this year. We need that concrete strategy in place. What will the fee be this September?

We need another Niamh Bhreathnach moment. We have surpluses. I do not understand why students and their families are the first in the firing line when we hear about things like tariffs. It was transformative to this society in the nineties when free fees were introduced. They were increased over a period but the late, great Niamh Bhreathnach had vision. It contributed hugely to the economic growth of this country in the nineties and into the noughties, much like free secondary level education did in the seventies. A third level qualification is now expected by many. It needs to be made as accessible as possible. We have among the highest fees in Europe. We are an outlier.The Cassells report and the OECD report have said we have among the highest student fees in Europe. I welcome the fact that efforts are being made to change the SUSI grant for the better through looking at adjacency rates. We need to look at estrangement as well in respect of who can access that grant. Ultimately, a promise was made regarding fees in the programme for Government so I ask for a reply on what the plan is and what the fee will be this coming September.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit.

Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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I thank Senator Harmon for raising this important issue and for the opportunity it provides to discuss the Government’s ongoing work to make further and higher education more accessible and more affordable. The Minister, Deputy Lawless, is today at an informal meeting of EU researchers in Copenhagen so unfortunately he cannot be here to discuss this topic himself.

The Government is acutely conscious of the financial challenges facing students. We are committed to easing the financial burden on students and their families by reducing the cost of education in a way that is sustainable, equitable and targeted. This is a programme for Government commitment. The current student support framework, such as student grant supports and fee supports, has played a significant role in facilitating access to and growth in higher education. We have already taken a number of significant steps to improve the support framework, including the elimination of participation fees for post-leaving certificate, PLC, courses from September 2022 and major permanent changes to the Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, student support scheme, such as the introduction of a new part-time SUSI grant scheme in 2024. Over the past three budgets, temporary cost-of-living measures were introduced to support our citizens, including a once-off €1,000 reduction in the €3,000 student contribution fee. These measures were welcome and necessary at the time but they were never intended to be permanent.

It is important to consider that currently, under the free fees initiative, the State covers tuition fees for all eligible full-time undergraduate students. In the 2023-24 academic year, over 143,000 students benefited from this support. This is a universal scheme and therefore a means test does not apply. Students are, however, required to pay the student contribution. This Government acknowledges that for many, this contribution presents a significant financial hurdle. That is where SUSI plays a vital role. In the 2024-25 year, over 65,000 students received support from SUSI to help cover this fee. These supports range from full coverage to partial grants of 50% or €500. The €500 grant introduced in 2023 is now a permanent feature of the scheme.

From this September, we will increase the income thresholds for student grants by 15%, expanding access to even more students, but we must and will go further. While student supports have played a very significant role in facilitating access to and growth in higher education, we have to bring forward plans that recognise the wider costs of attending education and promote access through sustainable investment in support measures. As we look to budget 2026, the focus of the Minister, Deputy Lawless, is on long-term, structural solutions that can provide certainty and fairness for students into the future. He is conscious of the financial pressures students face, not just tuition fees but accommodation, transport, materials and day-to-day living costs. The Minister has spent the past few months listening to the views of key stakeholders. He has had multiple engagements with students, apprentices, access officers, student services staff and advocacy groups and in April he hosted a national cost-of-education event, bringing together key voices from across the sector. These insights have been invaluable.

In preparation for budget 2026, the Minister, Deputy Lawless, will publish an options paper, which will outline the costs and potential impacts of various policy choices. This paper will inform the national debate and guide Government decisions. At this juncture, as the Senator will be well aware, no final decisions have been made and the Minister remains open to hearing from all stakeholders, students, families, institutions and advocacy groups.

Laura Harmon (Labour)
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I thank the Minister of State for the response. First, I note the positive indications regarding the student grant and the Government seeking to improve that and improve those supports. That has to be noted. However, it is an extremely disappointing and disrespectful answer to students and their families that this Government cannot give clarity to students on what the fee is going to be this September. I have people calling me - students and families - who are worried about the cost of living. They are sitting around kitchen tables asking whether they can afford to send their son or daughter, or in some cases multiple children, to college. We had a case of triplets in Cork whose family were wondering how they were going to afford €9,000 in fees, potentially, for the upcoming academic year. This is a huge cost to families at a time when the cost of living is rising. I can see no logic as to why the fee would now be increased when it was implemented as a cost-of-living measure but the cost of living and the cost of accommodation are rising in this country.

It raises the question as to whether this was a vote-buying measure. Was it just a vote-buying tactic for the electorate from parties that are now in government? It is the first thing the Government is coming out now and saying it will change. The student movement seems to be very united on this and will continue campaigning to ensure we do not have a fee increase in this country. As I say, the programme for Government commits to this. We hear of options papers. We had the Cassells report previously. This stinks of a kicking-the-can-down-the-road decision to me while students and families need clarity right now. Trinity College Dublin has already issued invoices to students for €3,000 for the coming academic year. This is extremely worrying and is causing huge distress to students and their families all across the country. The lack of clarity simply cannot continue from this Government. We need clarity. What is the fee going to be in September?

Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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I have been following and engaging in this debate for the last number of weeks, I think it is fair to say that this is just pure populism politics being playing by a lot of people in government and across the Opposition and I have no hesitation in saying that. When was there ever a budget announcement in July? The budget will be at the end of September or in October, the same as it has been for as long as I can remember, and I have been around politics a while. The Senator is standing up here saying she wants the Government to make an announcement now regarding the budget. She knows that cannot happen. She talks about wanting to have certainty and clarity. The Senator and I debated this on a radio programme about two weeks ago and I pointed out to her that with previous cost-of-living measures such as the energy payments, the fuel allowance, child benefit, the living alone allowance and a whole suite of other payments that were part of the cost-of-living package, she did not advocate for any of them. They were all part of the same package as that relating to student fees.

Why do Senator Harmon, the Fine Gael Senators and the Fine Gael TD who rang into the Joe Duffy radio show, or whatever talk show it was, not ask their party leader, who was Minister for further and higher education at the time? They should phone him and ask him. They should phone the subsequent Minister, Deputy O'Donovan. They brought it in as a cost-of-living measure. It was a Government decision, and the Government has decided there will not be a cost-of-living package on this occasion. The Senator will not get an announcement. What the Minister, Deputy Lawless, did when he went on radio and was trying to present it as being a big reveal was set it out factually as it is. The €1,000 reduction, and the Senator knows this well, was a one-off over a number of years. It was never baked into the base as a permanent measure. The Senator knows all this.

As regards the budget this year, let us see what happens. I imagine there will be a reduction. I would like to see a reduction and I will be calling for one. If people want to play politics with it and try to march the student body up and down to the top of the hill and make political capital out of it, they can be my guest. They can knock themselves out in doing so. However, the Senator knows, as do students, that it was a one-off. This time last year or the previous year, students were not asking for clarity, but this year everybody is looking for clarity. They will get it when the budget comes out.