Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)

Yes, absolutely. The €116 million in the main goes towards the €1,000 reduction in the student registration charge. I think it is fair to say we have to keep in context the fact that over the lifetime of this Government, we have done a lot of work to reform the SUSI grant system. We have increased thresholds and grant amounts. We also made technical adjustments to the scheme in terms of the adjacency rates. We widened the SUSI net to capture more people, which is a good thing to do, particularly in light of the rising cost of attending college. That is a job of work which we have done step by step over a number of budgets. It has increased the number of people who can avail of SUSI supports. The drop in the registration fee is something we flag every year as a year-on-year decision; no permanent decision has yet been taken on that. I am sure it is a challenge which the next Government will have to consider. We have had that decrease for a number of years, year-on-year.

I take every opportunity I can to highlight the student assistance fund. It is in the order of €18 million or €19 million year-on-year since this Department came into being in 2020. Each of our higher education institutions would have about €1 million available locally to help students who find themselves in exceptional, unforeseen circumstances where they need to avail of financial assistance. The real positive aspect of this is that it is managed locally by the student services offices. The student services people can deal with students on the front line, face to face. They know them and will have local knowledge. The students apply locally, the criteria are developed locally and the money is disbursed locally. It is another avenue through which people can be helped.