Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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To ask the Minister for Education and Skills in view of recent revelations regarding the numbers of students waiting for grants to be processed, the measures he will put in place to ensure that students are not forced out of third level education; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51331/12]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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In order to ensure that all targets are met by Student Universal Support Ireland (SUSI) a number of measures have been put in place to speed up the process of awarding student grants. This includes the provision of additional staffing in both the assessment unit and the outsourced document management unit. Weekly maintenance payment runs are in place and a range of processing efficiencies are being implemented on an on-going basis.

SUSI is aiming to achieve a target of 33,000 awards in total by the end of the year. SUSI is staffed to the level that has been requested and all the necessary resources should be in place to enable them to process applications to completion, subject to all the necessary documentation being in order to enable them to make a decision in each case. This week, a further 50 additional temporary staff have been approved to ensure that all targets are met from this point forward.