Eoghan Murphy (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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196. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills further to Parliamentary Question No. 560 of 24 February 2015, her plans to progress the change mooted by her predecessor, so that Irish expatriate citizens and their children, who are also citizens, are not penalised in terms of restrictions to access free-fee university education, in view of the fact that they had left the country for work reasons during the recession, as having to be back here for three out of five years of secondary education, as is currently the case, is too restrictive and unfair, in view of the developments in the economy since 2007. [18066/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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As outlined previously to the Deputy where undergraduate students do not qualify for free fees funding under the Free Fees Initiative they must pay the appropriate fee - either EU or Non-EU, as determined by each higher education institution. Higher education institutions are autonomous bodies and the level of fee payable by students who do not meet the requirements of the free fees scheme, including the residency requirement, is a matter for the relevant institution.

Due to concerns raised in relation to the fact that in some cases the higher non-EU fee was being charged to students who had EU/EEA/Swiss nationality but did not meet the residency clause for free fees, the previous Minister requested that higher education institutions charge the more moderate EU fee to such students who have completed at least five academic years of study (primary or post-primary level) in Ireland/EU/EEA/Switzerland.

There are no plans to amend the residency requirement of the Free Fees Initiative at present.