Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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Question 949: To ask the Minister for Education and Science her proposals to increase research and development capacity in third level institutions in the south east region to extend fourth level provision in the south east region; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [1334/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The Government's Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation is a multi annual, multi-billion euro investment in research and development activity for the period to 2013. The Strategy aims to see Ireland secure its position as one of the world's advanced knowledge economies and become renowned worldwide for the excellence of its research.

Central to this will be the development of the capacity of our higher education system for the achievement of key targets during the lifetime of the Strategy such as doubling the number of PhD graduates, attaining the necessary intellectual critical mass, advancing the quality of our post-graduate and PhD training, strengthening arrangements for industry collaboration and providing all the necessary supporting structures to achieve the research objectives of a range of sectors. The growth of fourth level education under the strategy will have a major impact on the profile of our higher education institutions.

My Department provides significant annual funding to support the development of research activities in our third level institutions. In 2008 an amount of €106 million in recurrent funding is being provided together with €94.3 million in capital funding.

The purpose and function of funding support in this context is to develop research capability and capacity in the Higher Education System, as a whole. It is not focused on specific institutions or regions. Allocations for research activities are, in the main, made as a result of independent evaluation and ultimately selected on the basis of the quality of the submitted proposal when matched against the criteria specified in the call for proposals.