Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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Question 1189: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the reason an application for a VEC maintenance grant in respect of a person (details supplied) in Dublin 11 has been refused; the further reason the SSIA account of this person's parents is included as reckonable income; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [25279/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Under the terms of my Department's 2005 third level student maintenance grant schemes the position is that, generally speaking, students who are entering approved courses for the first time are eligible for grants where they satisfy the prescribed conditions with regard to age, residence, means, nationality and previous academic attainment.

A mature candidate is defined as a student who is at least 23 years of age on 1 January of the year of entry or re-entry to an approved course. Mature candidates are categorised as either independent mature candidates or mature candidates dependent on parents. An independent mature candidate is defined to mean a mature candidate who was not ordinarily resident at home with his or her parents from 1 October 2004. Independent mature candidates are assessed without reference to either their parents' income or residence. For the purpose of the residency requirement "normal residence" is defined to mean the permanent or ordinary address of the candidate's parents or guardians from 1 October 2004, or, in the case of an independent mature candidate, his or her ordinary or permanent address from 1 October 2004.

My Department understands that the student in question has been ordinarily resident at home with his parents. Accordingly, he is ineligible to be assessed as an independent mature candidate. He is, however, eligible to be assessed as "a mature candidate dependent on parents". Other than in the case of independent mature students, candidates are assessed with reference to their parents income and address.

For the purposes of determining reckonable income, all investments must be declared, including savings certificates, life assurance bonds and other financial instruments where the interest-profit is accumulated and paid out as a lump sum at the end of the investment period. The amount of income to be included in respect of special savings incentive accounts, SSIAs, is the Government grant earned on the savings in the relevant tax year plus in the case of savings accounts, the gross interest earned in the relevant tax year, and, in the case of investment accounts, the investment profit earned in the relevant tax year. Investment losses sustained in the relevant tax year are deductible. The treatment of the SSIAs in this regard is consistent with the treatment of similar financial products such as Post Office savings bonds.