Third Level Education
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-02
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Paul Murphy (PBP), Dublin South-West

Just to confirm, the Minister is saying that he is open to changes continuing to take place to this strategy. That would obviously be welcome. I ask the Minister to commit to prioritising research that is for the public good. "Research on economic inequities, democratic participation, mental health, housing injustices, climate justice, education, and the full range of human experiences and societal processes must be valued on its own terms". That is a quote from the petition, which I think is very important. The current proposal suggests that non-applied research has to demonstrate its future economic utility in order to qualify for funding. That is precisely the problem with a short-term economic utility focus, which then leads to a downgrading of humanities, social sciences and so on in favour of those that have a more immediate commercial application, which would be a real problem.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-07-02/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:52:14+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-02