Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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495. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the estimated first year and full year cost of changing the qualifying criteria for the non-adjacent rate of the third-level grant from 45 km to 24 km. [36754/19]

Joe McHugh (Donegal, Fine Gael)
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Budget 2011 provided for a number of student grant measures which came into effect for the 2011/12 academic year, including the change in the assessment of the qualifying distance criterion for the non-adjacent rate of grant from 24 kilometres to 45 kilometres.

The first year cost of "decreasing the non-adjacent rate of third-level grants from 45 km to 24 km" is estimated to be in the region of €11.5m. The full year cost of this proposal would be in the region of €26m.

The above costings assume that a change to the distance criterion would result in a similar percentage of students qualifying for the higher non-adjacent grant support, as existed pre Budget 2011.