Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Question 247: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the date on which the student grant application forms for 2011-12 will be available; his views on whether the delay in publishing the application form for 2011-12 will cause unacceptable additional delays in the processing of applications and thus create additional financial hardship for students and their families; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15579/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The Deputy will probably be aware that, currently, there are four student grant schemes administered by 66 grant awarding bodies (local authorities and VECs) on my Department's behalf. However, earlier this year, the Student Support Act became law. This enables the consolidation of the four existing schemes into a single unified scheme.

As a consequence, a fundamental review of the schemes was necessary together with the formulation of secondary legislation. This process is nearing completion and I expect to be able to publish the new scheme shortly.

While the publication of the scheme will be a number of weeks later than last year, this is still considerably ahead of the publication date in previous years. I hope the Deputy will appreciate that this was unavoidable in view of the considerable additional work that had to be undertaken beyond the norm this year. Despite earlier publication of the schemes, one of the principal reasons for delays in the processing of applications is that many students still wait until very late in the process, frequently only after a CAO offer is made, to apply for a grant. My Department will continue to use a range of channels such as the USI, Institute of Guidance Counsellors and CAO etc. to encourage students to apply early. Every effort will be made in the grant awarding authorities to process grant applications in a timely manner once they have been received.