For clarity, I am not aware of any impact on this particular project as a result of any kind of funding withdrawal or shortfall. It is news to me if that is the case. It has not been raised with me by any of the college authorities or anybody else in the sector other than by way of the Deputy's suggestion today on the floor of the Dáil. As such, it is fair to say it is not a factor here. What is strongly a factor is delivering value for money. I hope the Deputy agrees with me that it is important State funding is u…

The Deputy will have to forgive me for saying I am not entirely sure what she is asking. On the one hand, she is calling for me to spend more money and, on the other, she is talking about being careful with taxpayers' money. I am a little confused as to what her ask is. Value for money is a key consideration. UCC is an autonomous body and a very well-run institution with an extremely competent chair, president and board. They have told me they intend to publish their renewed and revised plans early in the new year …

This is a timely question. On 26 November, I launched the new INSPIRE research infrastructure programme, which provides €750 million for capital investment in research infrastructure across the State and all our HEIs. It is a landmark moment for Ireland's national research and innovation system. As I am sure the Deputy has done, I have met with various stakeholders from the higher education system, including deans of research and presidents, and members of the research community, including PhD researchers and stude…

I understand the points the Deputy raised. I will be addressing student accommodation in the response to a later question, so I will not duplicate that now. The framework on which the INSPIRE programme is built was developed in collaboration with the sector. In March of this year, I put together an expert working group made up of people from the Irish Universities Association, people with experience of the PRTLI programme and expert academics. We very much looked to the sector to see what it needed and to seek its …

The programme will be delivered in two phases and will be managed by the Higher Education Authority in the first phase and by Research Ireland in the second. The first phase will establish a strategic baseline across the sector such that all investments are grounded in a systematic alignment with the particular university or HEI. It is a competitive fund and not a case of there being one for everyone in the audience. Funding will be awarded based upon excellence and impact, in alignment with the university. Univers…

I thank the Deputy. It is something I am focused on and it is in the programme for Government. It is something I have been working on since I took on the position. I am committed to continuing the progress of the technological universities as key drivers of regional and national development. They have fantastic potential and are already realising it. I think I have visited all of them at this stage - multiple sites within some of them. They are a strong regional accelerator in terms of bringing excellence and unive…

For clarity, I will provide a short recap of the historical position. The original institutes of technology, IoTs, did not have professorial grades. They were amalgamated, largely, to form the technological universities we have now. Within the IoTs, the comparative grade was senior lecturer 3. The scales, grades, bands and job titles did not innately map onto the universities'. In some cases, the legacy job titles, conditions and work programmes did not map either. For example, they did not necessarily work over th…

They are being closely monitored, not least by me. I keep a programme for Government tracker to make sure we make our targets and, as far as possible, get ahead of target in delivering all the items I signed up to deliver at the start of this year. The OECD report is extremely useful in setting out academic career structures, contracts, senior management and leadership structures and the benefits they bring to an organisation, which are well documented and on which we are all in agreement. In terms of the wider dev…

I thank the Deputy. I am very aware of the high cost of student accommodation and the burden it places on students, especially those from rural or outlying areas, although it is not limited to them. In my own household, which is in an urban area, my daughter has commuted to UCD for the past couple of years and it was not a short commute, despite the fact we are not terribly far away from the college geographically. There is an additional financial burden on students who have to make that commute or cannot secure ac…

I wish to confirm and restate that the maintenance grants have increased significantly in some cases, particularly those on the non-adjacent rungs of the grant system. That is something that is very important to me and that I was very determined to be able to do. As well as that, there is additional support for students with disabilities and mental health challenges. The thresholds have increased to the highest ever level, to the extent that 80% of households are now eligible for at least some form of grant support…

I am glad the Deputy mentioned the rent a room scheme because that is an important tax relief that is available. Householders can earn up to €14,000 per year tax free by renting rooms to students. It has also been extended to local authority tenants, and at the end of last month, over 5,200 rent a room student beds were on offer in higher education institutions across the country, so that is a very significant measure. In regard to the stock that is on hand, the Deputy mentioned the level of delivery in her opening…

I thank the Deputy. I thank him also for the invitation to Cavan recently. I was delighted to be able to take that up. We visited the Cavan Institute, where we saw, among other things, the original equipment manufacturing, OEM, apprentices at work on the advanced manufacturing side. We also saw the students at Youthreach, which is a very critical intervention with youth. From there, I went to Monaghan Institute and finished the day in the Atlantic Technological University, ATU, in Letterkenny, where we launched the…

Absolutely. The opportunity that Cavan provides was very evident on the day of my visit. There is a great opportunity to continue to expand educational provision there on site at the Cavan Institute. That would be encompassed by the college of the future programme, which I am working out through the national development plan. I am examining progress on that at the moment but I would be confident that will be one of the projects that will do well from the fund. On the all-island dimension, I was pleased to be able t…

All-Ireland entities are always fashionable in my household. We can have all the citizens' assemblies and deliberate as much as we want to but doing it for real is what counts and that is what we are doing here. There is a very ambitious timetable to make that collaboration come together. I intend to bring legislation through the Houses in the new year to set out the mechanics of how it will be enabled. It is important that Dundalk Institute of Technology continues to enjoy strong autonomy as part of the HEA landsc…

I thank the Deputy for his continued advocacy, support and championing of ideas for this sector. The national student accommodation strategy 2025 to 2035 is due to be published in the coming weeks and will be considered and agreed by Government before being officially launched. It is at a very advanced stage. The strategy aims to make higher education more accessible by addressing both affordability to ensure students can afford rents and secure accommodation and also the viability of supply, which the Deputy's que…

I have to wish Sallins the best of luck on Sunday in its own intermediate final, so we have to get that in as well on the day. I will take Deputy Cahill's question first and then revert to Deputy Connolly. It was good to visit Killarney and Tralee recently along with Deputy Cahill, the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality, and the Minister of State, Deputy Michael Healy-Rae. It was a good visit. The Pretty Polly site is moving ahead. I know this is very important to Deputy Cahill. I was pleased to be able…

The Deputy made a number of points. I totally agree with him that the provision of serviced sites on or adjacent to campuses is key. There is a significant earmarked fund within the student strategy and my national development plan budget to allow for those sites to progress, and to be identified and serviced, with facilities where necessary. The local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, was used in the housing sector and the technological sector student accommodation programme is under way. The Deputy m…

This is a consistent theme of the Deputy's and an area he takes a significant interest in. I thank him for his ongoing advocacy. The Government is committed to increasing healthcare training places more broadly, but very much including dentistry, in line with commitments in the programme for Government. I like to think I made some good inroads into that in the first ten months of the term. At present, University College Cork admits around 50 students annually to its dentistry programme, split evenly between Irish o…

The planned intake in the current year is 78 Irish students, with 26 of those in UCC, 32 in Trinity College and 20 in RCSI. The UCC outreach proposal I mentioned has the potential to raise intake by another 35 student places. All those measures combined strengthen and increase the opportunities for domestic students. It is the case that a course like this cannot be ramped up overnight because it requires extensive practical training. That can limit capacity, but my Department and the Department of Health are helpin…

I will leave my colleague the Minister for Health to answer more comprehensively on the issues the Deputy raised regarding public health provision in Cork and the south west and how dental places fit into that. My Department is working to increase the number of places and courses and invest in the equipment and facilities in UCC, RCSI, Trinity College and elsewhere to ensure there is a sufficient and expanded pipeline of dental graduates coming on stream. I expect many of those will feed into public sector provisio…