Research Funding
Dail Éireann — 2025-12-11
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James Lawless (FF), Kildare North

Under budget 2025, additional funding was announced for Research Ireland in order to increase its PhD stipend level to €25,000, representing an increase of 31% in just two years. This announcement builds upon my Department's consistent focus and progression on this issue. That came into effect from 1 January this year and, given the significant growth in such a short space of time, I have no immediate plans to increase the figure further. The €25,000 was the ask very recently. It was a significant increase on what was there previously and we have done that now. As of this year, we have reached that €25,000 figure for PhD stipends.
My Department has also implemented the recommendations of the independent review of State supports for PhD researchers for an optimum stipend level of €25,000. This review exercise was the first time that PhD provision in Ireland was comprehensively reviewed. For those PhD students in receipt of stipends from national competitive funding agencies outside the remit of my Department, the level of stipend awarded is at the discretion of each funder and its parent Department. Put simply, those agencies under my remit and my Department and in receipt of funding from Research Ireland are providing the €25,000 stipend. There may be other funders outside the remit of my Department which have their own arrangements, but certainly they are all encouraged, at least, to reach that threshold. There are also institutional scholarship supports, sometimes provided by the higher education institution, primarily, and of course there are some private sector sponsorships, etc., as well.
In terms of the higher education institutions and universities, how they use and distribute their core funding is at their own discretion. They are autonomous institutions and those in the private sector will have their own arrangements they enter into with individuals freely. There is a degree of discretion on those but certainly the agencies I fund and control are required to meet the €25,000 stipend and I understand that they are doing so.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-11/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:48+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-11