Instinctively, I am very sympathetic to the point the Deputy made to the effect that there is real urgency here for all of us - regulatory bodies, universities and clinical placement providers - to try to be innovative, to completely protect and safeguard quality and professional standards regulation 100% and to see what roles those involved can play in increasing the supply. This is not about numbers, as the Deputy said, but it is about a child waiting to see a speech and language therapist or an occupational ther…

Now we are talking about something I can definitely help with. "Yes" is the short answer. This year we announced 1,056 additional places in college from September. We did not do what we had done in previous years, which was to announce a large global number. We have tried to target them in areas where there is a critical skills need, particularly a public service skills need. There are more nursing places this year, well over 100, and more medicine places. The single biggest increase ever, and certainly in a very l…

I thank the Deputy for his question. I welcome his appointment to the Joint Committee on Education, Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. We are looking forward to working with him on that committee. Inclusion is one of the core strategic goals for our Department. Our ambition is to ensure that we provide support and opportunities to persons with special and additional needs. On the higher education side, I am pleased to say that the target set in the National Plan for Equity of Access to …

I would be delighted to do so. I would be very happy to meet with the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. If it is outlining the issue to the Deputy then it is definitely an issue I want to hear about and see how we can rectify it. Understandably there is a degree of flexibility and discretion around the student assistance programme because there has to be. This is not an excuse for a lack of information or support we can provide the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. The idea is that there is discretion and flexibility t…

The short answer to Deputy Murnane O'Connor is "Yes", in that we do need to do more and to be better in providing information. I thank Deputy Stanton for contacting me and bringing this issue to my attention. It had not been brought to my attention previously. I immediately contacted my officials and I will engage with them again after question time. It would be very unfair if people, through no fault of their own, were caught abroad because of a global pandemic and the criterion was used against them. I am activel…

I take the point on learning difficulties and I will revert directly to the Deputy on it.

Sometimes I am asked a question that makes me eager to ask questions in return because I am interested in this area. The Department wants to hear a little bit more from the Deputy on this. I will read what I have and we might engage a bit more on it. The fund for students with disabilities provides funding to higher and further education institutions for the delivery of services and supports for students with disabilities. We know this. The fund is intended to assist in offering supports and services to eligible st…

I would be very interested in following up on the issue with the Deputy. I will ask my officials listening in to the debate to expect to hear from the Deputy on the matter. My very clear understanding in checking this out is that the higher or further education institutions determine the level of support provided, but they do not do it in a vacuum. They do it based on the needs assessment. If there is a needs assessment for any student which states that there is a particular requirement, the relevant institution sh…

The Deputy's question has been most useful in providing valuable insight through the information she has picked up. I will follow up on all three issues the Deputy has highlighted. On the specific matters raised in respect of insurance companies and the non-academic PA, I do not doubt what the Deputy said, because she has heard it from authoritative sources. However, it is very frustrating to hear that even though we have a needs-based, student-centred approach, a student cannot leave campus to go for a coffee with…

The Government's Housing for All Plan contains a detailed and comprehensive series of actions to substantially increase supply of all types of housing and accommodation, including student accommodation. I think it is sometimes hard to decouple the issues that students face in relation to accommodation from the broader housing issues. That is why I have referenced Housing for All. The plan is backed by the largest housing budget in the history of the State. There is a €20 billion budget behind it. I have been engagi…

I think there are four actions we need to take. The first is that we need to take a flexible local approach. We have said several times that we want to hear from any higher education institution in any part of the country that has a local solution. If there is something that can be done on campus or near campus, or if the institution has a building that can be converted into student accommodation, we want to hear about it, and we will provide assistance in making that happen. There is an example of this approach be…

Perfect. I will give it my best shot. I agree with Deputy Conway-Walsh that all of us in the House should condemn anybody who attempts to price-gouge in the middle of a horrific illegal invasion and massive humanitarian crisis. I will talk to her in more detail about that. Deputy Murnane O'Connor is right that as we develop the technological universities, and there is one in the south east in Carlow-Kilkenny, accommodation needs to come with that. That is why I am delighted we have clarity now on the borrowing fram…

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue but also for the work he did in his time in the Department of Education to promote apprenticeships. It has helped us get to this place. As he will be aware, apprenticeship is a demand-driven, employer-led system that aims to develop the skills of an apprentice in order to meet the needs of industry and the labour market. In light of that employer-led model of apprenticeship, the level of apprenticeship opportunities and associated advertising for those roles in any particul…

I do not disagree with the Deputy on the need for a much better and bigger job to be done on the central and public advertising of apprenticeship opportunities. That is part of the cultural shift that needs to take place. We have set up a national apprenticeship alliance and its job is to look at all of these areas. Now we as a State are providing financial incentives to all apprentice employers in the country, it is not unreasonable that in return we ask for things in terms of how these are advertised. That is a r…

To respond to Deputy Stanton, yes I have. Indeed, some of the changes we have brought to the CAO website have been things the guidance counsellors have been campaigning for over a decade so they are very much driving this and I am eager to work very closely with them. Deputy Bruton is entirely right. The public sector needs to step up here. To be really clear, it has not done so. A public sector that employs around 300,000 taking on around 200 apprentices per year is offensive. It is offensive to me, offensive to t…

I thank the Deputy for raising this extremely important matter. Bystander training can be a crucial intervention to help educate people about sexual and domestic violence prevention. This type of training programme can highlight the danger of normalising abusive behaviour. It cultivates an understanding of people's capacity to intervene and it can provide learners with a safe environment to better understand appropriate social interactions. It also helps to identify unacceptable behaviour, ensuring an understanding…

I thank the Deputy. I will certainly familiarise myself with that American example. Much progress has been made by the higher education sector in recent years, as, quite frankly, it had to be made. We need to take these programmes out from behind the walls of the universities and make them more widely available across society. Professor Crowley has led in that regard. There has also been the good example of the active consent programme in NUI Galway under Pádraig MacNeela. We now have an online hub regarding consen…

The colleges and schools have been contacted. The first letter I wrote to university presidents when I took up this role was not about the important issue of future funding and the like but was about the whole issue of sexual harassment and consent. We wrote to every university president and requested that they put in place a plan for their institutions. We asked how each of the presidents would adopt a zero-tolerance approach and what they would do to tackle sexual harassment. I was not asking them to hide beyond …

I thank the Deputy for the question. My Department, the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, and I are strongly committed to supporting the well-being of the population through the provision of graduates with the key competencies and skills to be effective in health and education workforces and to support a range of public services, including educational psychology. While colleges are absolutely free to provide whatever courses they want, it is right and proper that when it comes to the public service provision…

Absolutely. The role of our Department is to provide, working with our sector, the capacity and pathways for graduates, as well courses and upskilling and reskilling across a range of public services. When the HSE and the Department of Health complete their work on their psychology review with the Department of Education, we stand ready to do more on this. The Deputy is entirely right. I saw this during my time in health and I see it now in this Department. There are many times where it is not just funding that is …