John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Question 106: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Education and Skills if her attention has been drawn to the fact that social welfare recipients who change from one long-term social welfare payment to another long-term social welfare payment are being prevented from obtaining a third level grant top up due to a technicality in the system, whereby a combination of time on long-term social welfare payments is unacceptable for grant purposes; if she will examine the case of a person (details supplied) in County Waterford who had to transfer from lone parent allowance to jobseeker's allowance due to the age of their dependent and has been refused the top up allowance; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [38615/10]

Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)
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To qualify for the Special Rate of maintenance grant, an applicant must qualify for the ordinary maintenance grant in respect of the 2010/11 academic year. In addition, total reckonable income must not exceed a specified amount, which is €22,703 in the 2009 tax year. Finally, on the operative date, 31st December 2009 for the 2010/11 academic year, the reckonable income must include one of the eligible long-term social welfare payments prescribed under the scheme.

Where a person goes directly from one eligible social welfare payment to another, without a break in payment, the continuous period spent on both eligible payments is taken into consideration when assessing eligibility for the Special Rate of grant.

The decision on eligibility for a student grant is a matter, in the first instance, for the relevant grant awarding authority i.e. the applicant's local authority or VEC.

Where a grant application is refused, the reason for the refusal is given by the grant awarding authority.

An applicant may appeal the decision to the relevant local authority or VEC.

Where the grant awarding authority decides to reject the appeal, the applicant may appeal this decision to my Department by submitting an appeal form outlining clearly the grounds for the appeal.

No appeal has been received by my Department to date from the candidate referred to by the Deputy.