Vol. 1030 No. 4
88. Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science if he will provide an update on the capital funding to unlock student accommodation projects and deliver approximately 3,000 student beds, currently at advanced stages of planning but unable to progress; if he will ensure that this accommodation is affordable; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [59803/22]
Will the Minister provide an update on the specific amount of capital funding allocated to the higher education institutions, HEIs, to deliver the student accommodation, as was agreed by the Cabinet this week? I understand the Minister is unlocking 667 of the over 3,000 units that are shelved. Will he confirm the money made available is €32 million and that it will provide a grant of €48,000 per unit? Will he guarantee all those units will be affordable for ordinary working families?
I thank Deputy Conway-Walsh for the question. She is correct; the Government decision this week allocated an additional €32 million to HEIs for the provision of, as she said, 667 additional units. As the Deputy probably knows, they are in Maynooth, Galway and Limerick. I can come back on some of those details in a moment.
My Department has been engaged intensively in examining issues with student accommodation in the context both of the overall pressures within the general residential rental market, which are posing significant difficulties for students, and the escalation in building costs that has slowed the construction of purpose-built student accommodation by publicly-funded higher education institutions. Earlier this year I established a dedicated unit for student accommodation in my Department and received the endorsement of the Cabinet committee on housing to rapidly explore measures that might assist. A dual-track approach has been adopted through a concentration, in the short term, on the small number of institutions where planning permission is in place and plans, though stalled, are at an advanced stage. Meanwhile, wider planning is being initiated in order that a broader range of project options can be developed and considered next year. At the Government meeting this week I received endorsement on the proposed overall approach and specific approval for the three projects I referenced.
The approach adopted will see the State assist with the cost of building student accommodation so as to ensure increased availability and promote greater access, in particular for priority student groups identified in the national access plan, which was published in August. At the heart of the new policy is promotion of the delivery of student accommodation and provision of resources to ensure that those most in need are prioritised. The Government has agreed to a short-term activation plan to stimulate the supply of affordable accommodation. The immediate priority is to deliver on projects where planning permission already exists but where developments have not proceeded due to increasing construction costs. Support for three such proposals is being made available in respect of the University of Limerick, Maynooth University and the University of Galway and this proposal could deliver up to 700 additional beds. These are in addition to the 1,190 additional beds delivered this year or on track for delivery in 2023. In addition, we are continuing to engage with the other institutions that have full planning permission, as the Deputy referred to.
I welcome this approach because we have wanted to have it for so long, in the sense of there being an investment and recognising student accommodation is integral to access to third level. This is especially so for students from rural areas who cannot go to college without having accommodation. However, a decade of underinvestment in higher education has left us with this chronic lack of student accommodation. The plan to part-fund only 667 student beds does not go far enough because of the extent of the problem, particularly in the last 12 months, but also for years beforehand. Due to the chronic underinvestment in third level, we have an accumulation there to address. It does not reflect the scale and severity of the housing emergency. As the Minister said, there are more than 3,000 student beds sitting on the shelf due to the lack of Government support. Dublin City University, DCU, has had 990 additional beds with planning permission since 2019. That is a significant number of beds in the Dublin area and this needs to be the first step in what the Minister is doing. I want to see what other progress we can expect in that area. When will the accommodation be available for students, who are in a dire situation?
I welcome the Deputy's welcome. I think there was political consensus in the House the State should intervene in providing funding to build college-owned student accommodation. We might have differing views but there was a general consensus across the House that needed to happen and it is now happening.
If it does not sound too peculiar to say, I contend it is wrong to focus on the 667. It is great they are unlocked in Maynooth, Galway and Limerick and I thank those institutions. They will now proceed and go to construction in 2023. The bigger win this week for student accommodation is there is now a policy and a mechanism for the State to intervene. I assure the Deputy we are intensively engaging with DCU and University College Dublin, UCD, and they with us, to see if we can move their projects forward. There are five universities with active planning; three are over the line and two we are engaging with. This week we have provided €1 million to the technological universities, which are close to the Deputy's heart, to allow them put their plans in place to benefit from a similar scheme in 2023. It is this new policy approach that is the most significant element.
I agree on the policy approach. It should have been done many years ago. However, I want to ensure all those units are affordable. I do not want X number of units to be delivered, only for many of them to be beyond the reach of students. We will be in a worse situation if we end up like that. The devil will be in the detail of the contracts and agreements signed between the HEIs and the Government. It is about meeting the needs of students and families, who are really suffering with the cost-of-living and housing crises, not about the needs of people who are trying to make money on the back of hard-pressed students and families. I therefore want to know how many units are affordable.
On delivery, if it is going to construction in 2023, we are looking at 2024 and 2025, which is quite a bit into the future. That is why there must be an absolute urgency around this to get the student accommodation situation addressed. People are concerned about the students who will be starting next September, never mind the ones who are in a really precarious situation this year.
There are two elements here. Everybody benefits from extra supply. If we take Maynooth University, we know for every person who got a student accommodation bed on campus this year there were six applications. Therefore, even at current market rates there is demand for more. To be clear, what we are funding are not-for-profit units. We are funding publicly-funded institutions to deliver student accommodation. It is student accommodation that has to wash its face but not student accommodation seeking to make profit. Every cent the taxpayer invests will have to see a return in the form of affordability measures and that means below-market rents. I accept there is detail to be worked through. The Deputy is right on the construction. These are projects that will go to construction in 2023 but we must break the cycle. We cannot just look at this from September to September. We must take a new policy initiative that will begin to improve things. There are other student accommodation beds coming on stream. There are, for example, 674 units in Galway that are due to be completed in January that will be available for students in September. They are separate to this.
89. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science if he will engage with the PhD researcher unions (details supplied) to ensure that all PhD research students receive a living wage income or above via their stipend; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [60122/22]
There are approximately 8,000 PhD researchers in the country. They do a vast amount of the teaching in our institutions of higher education. The great majority of them get stipends that mean they are in actuality earning less than the minimum wage. This is true even for those with the best stipends. That compares with the Nordic countries, where they get up to €50,000 as a starting point. Will the Minister agree, as part of the review, to meet the PhDs Collective Action Union and the Postgraduate Workers Alliance to ensure this situation is remedied urgently?
I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. We have obviously introduced some measures in the budget as an immediate and tangible relief against some of the challenges of the rising cost of living. This included a once-off payment in 2022 of €500 for PhD students who receive an Irish Research Council, IRC, or Science Foundation Ireland, SFI, award and a €500 increase to the stipend baseline in 2023 for PhD students who receive an IRC or SFI award. In certain circumstances, PhD students may also qualify for support from the State's student grant support scheme, Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI.
I agree that we need to do a lot better and that we need to do an awful lot more to support PhD students, and to support Ireland, because this is a matter of both our social and economic well-being into the future. For that reason, and having heard very clearly from PhD researchers, I have commissioned a national review of all State supports for PhD researchers. In this regard, I was pleased to recently appoint Dr. Andrea Johnson and David Cagney as external co-chairs for the review. The scope of the review will cover a range of issues, such as current PhD researcher supports, including financial supports; the adequacy, consistency and equity of current arrangements across research funders and higher education institutions, including equity and welfare considerations; the status of PhD researchers, given the debate about whether they should be students or employees, including a review of international comparators and models; graduate outcomes for PhD graduates, including the benefits to the researcher; and visa requirements and duration for non-EU students and their spouses, which comes up quite a bit. The review, informed by a robust evidence base, will be completed in early 2023. It will look at issues of adequacy, taking account of costs and other issues, such as the exemption of the PhD stipend from income tax. A list of the stakeholders that will be consulted as part of the review has not yet been agreed but it will be open to everybody, including the public, to make submissions. In light of the Deputy's question, I will ensure the groups he referenced will be engaged with as part of the review. I will convey that to the co-chairs.
I appreciate that. I think they would appreciate meeting the Minister. While the opportunity for them to make submissions is important, the end game is the critical thing here. The vast majority of people doing PhD research in this country are living in poverty. That seriously impacts on their ability to do their research or even continue as PhD researchers. We give more than €700 million in tax breaks, mostly to private companies, for research and development and yet in our universities and higher education institutions, our researchers are living in poverty, in most cases earning less than the minimum wage. There is huge discrimination against non-EU PhD students, with many of them doing unpaid teaching and not being treated as workers when they clearly are. Without them, many of our higher education institutions simply would not function and yet they are either not paid or are paid below the minimum wage. They need to be treated as workers, as they are elsewhere. There is no question about it. They need to be treated as employees with collective bargaining rights, sick pay and all the other things because that is what they are doing. They are working in our universities and teaching our undergraduates. We should recognise how important they are, given the skills shortages we have and the need for us to be at the cutting edge of research and development, rather than forcing most of them to live in poverty.
This is a root-and-branch review. It is not simply looking at what the level of the stipend should be; it is looking at all the issues, including how a PhD researcher is classified and whether they are students or employees. I have had engagement with postgraduates. There are some countries people reference as good examples of how PhD researchers are looked after where they are employees and there are other countries people reference where they are not. Looking at international comparisons is important, as is looking at what is best practice and wanting Ireland to be best in class. I share that desire. Next year, for the very first time, we will bring a stand-alone national research Bill through the Oireachtas. That will obviously go through pre-legislative scrutiny and the like. There will be an opportunity in legislation to tease through the research ecosystem and how everyone interacts with it. The review is the best way for people to make their views known. It is not an in-house review; it is an external review. The terms of reference are comprehensive and the first task of the reviewers is to engage directly with PhD researchers.
It is welcome that we want to be best in class but let us be clear what the starting point is; we are worst in class.
I do not think that is right.
The average PhD pay in Europe is €32,000. In the Nordic countries, it starts at €50,000 and progresses to €55,000 on a fixed-term, four-year contract. In the Netherlands, researchers get about 10% more. Indeed, a lot of our people who are doing postgraduate and research work are going to the Netherlands because everything, from housing to fees to the cost of living, is so much better in places like the Netherlands. That is bad news, not just for our PhD researchers but for the entire country. It is urgent that we listen to them and that we get up to a level where they are paid for the work they do and are paid sufficiently well that they are not living in poverty or having to do other jobs impacting on their research. They should be properly remunerated for the work they do so they are not living in poverty. We have a hell of a long way to go. They are also affected by the all the other issues we are facing, like housing and the cost of living. Many of them have families and the majority of our PhD researchers are living below the minimum wage. It is an outrageous situation, quite frankly.
We can certainly agree that retaining and recruiting the best talent into our country is key. It is key to our future economic and social well-being. That is why in Impact 2030, Ireland's national research and innovation strategy, we quite rightly place a real focus on the researchers themselves. This review stems from that and from listening directly to researchers and postgraduate students. As recently as yesterday, I met with PhD researchers and postgraduate students with disabilities, who are working across our university sector, and heard directly from them. We are engaging but we need to get to a point where we have a very clear set of recommendations. I accept the issue around the stipend. Consistency of approach to the stipend is important, perhaps with a national minimum stipend level. We also need to look at other issues because I hear directly from them about other issues, including people who come into the country and find their spouse cannot work. There is a variety of issues here. We have tried to capture a broad gambit of issues in the terms of reference. This review will report back to my Department early next year.
90. Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science the reason that such little progress has been made in clearing the backlog of apprentices waiting to access off-the-job training in further education colleges and technological universities, given that 4,937 apprentices have currently been waiting over six months to be given a date to begin off-the-job training; the steps that he is taking to facilitate apprentices accessing training close to home; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [59804/22]
Why is so little progress being made in clearing the backlog of apprentices waiting to access off-the-job training in further education colleges and technological universities, given that 4,937 apprentices have been waiting over six months to be given a date to begin their off-the-job training? Can the Minister let us know the steps he has taken to facilitate apprentices accessing training close to home? Over the last two and a half years, the apprenticeship system has been chronic and chaotic, with one in four apprentices waiting more than six months to even get a date to start their off-the-job training in either further education or technological universities. It is higher again for certain apprentices such as electricians. I am frustrated at the lack of progress we are making in this area, but not half as frustrated as the apprentices themselves.
I thank the Deputy for highlighting this important issue. By any objective measure, there has been an unprecedented level of focus on apprenticeships by my Department since its creation. In fact, I would argue that one of the big benefits of the establishment of my Department two and a half years ago was a policy focus on the area of apprenticeship, whether through the apprenticeship action plan, a new national apprenticeship office, the highest ever number of new registered apprentices last year at 8,607, employer grants, a huge range of courses, or massive capital investment to try to address some of the issues so we can train more apprentices in the regions. The Deputy and I spoke about that in Castlebar during the week. However, I fully accept that there are real challenges around the Covid backlog, given there was a situation where all learning had to go online. Obviously people cannot do their entire apprenticeship online so the practical elements significantly deteriorated during that time.
There has been a substantial increase in apprenticeship registrations, with 40% extra in 2021 compared to 2019, which was the last normal year before the pandemic. This strong growth is welcome. Indeed, it is essential to meeting our construction and green skills needs. The apprenticeship system has been engaging with meeting this greatly increasing demand while at the same time trying to recover from the impact of the extended closures of the training system during Covid. There has been a major response across the craft apprenticeship system to the delays in accessing off-the-job training and significant progress has been achieved in the number waiting over six months. I thank everyone involved in this. The number stood at almost 5,300 in August and is now reduced to 4,937, notwithstanding the fact that there have been many new registrations at the same time. It is important to understand that the number waiting over six months, which is reducing in absolute terms, also turns over continually due to those accessing training coming off the list throughout the year. I assure the Deputy that absolutely everything that is humanly possible is being done to get this backlog addressed. I will take her through those measures in a moment.
What I want to know is when the backlog will be dealt with because I get a different answer every time I ask this question. It is difficult to compare figures. Last year we were working on a waiting list of more than 8,000 people. This year we get the number of people that are waiting just under six months. The figures are difficult to decipher. In the meantime, we have a situation where many apprentices are waiting and I know they are contacting the Minister as well because they are contacting me. I am really concerned about the impact this is having on them financially and on their mental health and well-being. We need to look as well at the number of apprentices who have dropped out of the system because of this. Whatever about new apprentices, which I always welcome, we have to deal with the backlog and face up to the current situation where people are having to wait too long. They are having to wait to do an apprenticeship that was supposed to take four years and is now taking five and six years and it is just not on.
The answers the Deputy gets are not changing. There were more than 11,000 people waiting at the peak in August 2021. We engaged very intensively with SOLAS to find out how long somebody would generally wait, forgetting Covid-19. If Covid-19 had never happened, the normal time somebody would generally wait between one phase and the other is six months. That is the standard time people wait between moving from one phase to the other as part of what they call the standard based apprenticeship, SBA, model. I think it is quite right and proper now that we make sure that the people are not waiting longer than the six months, the genuine Covid-19 backlog. That number is falling and it is falling in real terms. It is genuinely truthfully falling but I absolutely accept there is more work that needs to be done and we will not rest until the backlog is cleared. The programmes with the longest waiting lists, which are electrical, plumbing and carpentry, have been reformed and these changes are now running through the system with increased numbers of apprentices been called to off-the-job training. In addition, all classes which had been running at half capacity are now back in full; capital funding of €20 million was provided to extend and upgrade facilities and a further fund of €17 million has been provided as well. I apologise I am out of time but I can take the Deputy through it.
I thank the Minister. Going into a new apprenticeship needs to be attractive to young people and indeed to people throughout their life cycle. They get paid very little for the very hard work they do and the Government and SOLAS needs to get this right. We know that years of under-investment have left a shortage of capacity in the system but the fact is that only 1,798 apprentices became fully qualified tradespeople in 2021 and that is close to 600 fewer than in 2020 and represents the lowest number of newly qualified tradespeople since 2017. This is a really serious situation. We also have to look at the offsite training places and provide them closer to home. We all know what the accommodation and housing situation has done. Will the Minister ask everybody involved in apprenticeships and in making the decisions to place apprentices as near as possible to their homes so that we cut down on some of the costs that are involved for our apprentices.
I agree with the last point but the Deputy knows when quoting those figures that obviously Covid-19 had an impact on the pace at which people were able to fully qualify as an apprentice. I do not think that is news; that is a reality of the Covid-19 pandemic when our training centres had to shut down for sustained periods of time to keep people safe. The more important figure is that more people than ever before are putting up their hands and saying they want to be apprentices. Those figures are there too and are very strong. I agree that we have to work to make apprenticeships as attractive as possible. The Deputy is entirely correct on that point but I think, or certainly hope, she would agree that resources are not the issue here. Every cent being sought by SOLAS and by the education and training boards, ETBs, to expand apprenticeships is forthcoming. We are developing and expanding apprenticeship facilities all around the country. We have already put €20 million into capital funding to deal with the backlog; provided a further €17 million, €6 million of which is to train and bring in additional instructors; and over one hundred additional posts have been approved. I want to see our technological universities now and our new further education and training, FET, colleges of the future become those apprenticeship hubs in the region so that people can access that training closer to home and in their communities.
91. Deputy Seán Canney asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science the progress that is being made on the delivery of the new STEM building for the Galway Campus of the Atlantic Technology University; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [60119/22]
I raise an important issue that is close to my own heart which is the development of what we call the science, technology, engineering and mathematics, STEM, building in the Galway campus of the Atlantic Technological University, ATU. As we know, STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and maths. This project has been talked about for a long number of years and as a former lecturer and former student of the college in Galway, I know how close it is to the hearts all of the lecturers, staff and students. Will the Minister provide an update on where we are going with it?
Objectively, this was a really great week for education in Galway. We saw approximately €100 million announced in projects for further education and higher education in the city and county of Galway. We saw a multimillion euro development in the Deputy's own bailiwick where I know he lectured, in the Atlantic Technological University - some €19 million from memory - that will see a new learner facility developed for science and computing students among others. We also saw Galway chosen as a location for a major further education college which will see a 40% increase in the number of full-time students in further education there. Specifically regarding this project - the Deputy and I have discussed this - the new STEM building project at the Atlantic Technological University Galway campus is included in what we call bundle 2 of the higher education public private partnership programme. Bundle 2 consists of five projects and is currently at tender stage. The Deputy will understand that this obviously competitive process restrains me somewhat in commenting too much on it. Construction price inflation and volatility in the construction market is obviously a challenge in all our construction projects however the procuring authority comprising my own Department, the National Development Finance Agency and the Higher Education Authority is working within the parameters of the procurement process to make progress. As the Deputy will appreciate, it is a live procurement matter at the competitive dialogue stage, and many of the details are commercially sensitive. Notwithstanding this, it is currently estimated the programme will achieve financial close and will move forward. I am optimistic progress will be made on this and I will keep in contact with the Deputy directly regarding this issue.
I thank the Minister and acknowledge the fact that he was down in Galway. These investments are vitally important and that is a lot of money in a good week for the region in terms of educational facilities. Referring to the STEM building, when I was lecturing there seven years ago, and for a number of years before that, we were talking about what the Minister called bundle 2 and those five projects within that. The bundle is running around the place for many years now. It is important to state that many of the lecturers and students are still being taught in classrooms which were build 50 years ago. This is the 50th anniversary of the regional technical college, RTC, building opening and the classrooms were designed for a different era. This project will not cure all ills but it is a big step forward because Galway provides a significant number of STEM graduates to the workplace and they do great work. I am delighted to see things are improving and that project is progressing but I hope we get a conclusion. We are all aware of construction inflation but it is important we bring this to right conclusion.
I agree with the Deputy's sentiments. I am aware this bundle has been on the run for a while and I hear his frustration on that point. I want to assure him and his constituents, and the staff and students in ATU Galway in particular, that things have not been standing still. There is a very live process under way in relation to bundle 2 which includes this STEM project for Galway. I have confirmed to the Deputy in the Dáil this morning that we are hopeful of being able to bring that to a financial close. I just do not want to say anything that in any way undermines the work of my Department and others involved as the procuring agency. I also make the point, which in fairness the Deputy has acknowledged, that while this project has been working its way through the various processes, other projects in ATU Galway, from a capital point of view, have progressed. We announced a multi-million euro investment project this week which will expand and improve facilities for students in a range of areas, including science and computing, and there is also the acquisition for the ATU Galway campus of the Crowley Park lands, a project that was also running around for quite a few years and which I was delighted to be able to bring to a conclusion earlier this year
I thank the Minister for all of that and there is a huge amount of investment to come yet. Crowley Park is a significant acquisition for the facility. It is only right that was done. In fact, we should have bought the hotel across the way when it was available through NAMA and secured that site as well. At the time it did not happen for various reasons, none more so than the fact that GMIT at the time could not raise its own funds and Government did not have funds.
Hopefully, ATU, which has university status, will be capable of raising funds. The last major project that was done in GMIT was launched in 2000. I worked as a contracts manager on that project. Work on the beautiful sails that are located at the front of the campus, on the library and on all of the surrounding area was done in 2000. Some 22 years later, we are still waiting for the next major project. The campus deserves such a project.
I assure the Minister that we will not rest on our laurels. We will continue to fight for further resources for the educational facilities in the region. It is important for regional development that we continue to support all of those educational facilities. I thank the Minister for his support on this matter.
Not that it is needed, but I offer my encouragement to the Deputy in continuing his work. There is a major vehicle for the west and the north west in the form of the ATU. There is a brilliant leadership team in place, including the president, Dr. Orla Flynn, and the chair of the governing authority, Maura McNally. I was in that beautiful library on Monday last. To use the hotel as an example, some of the changes we made this week will ensure that ATU and other facilities can benefit in the future. For example, the devolved grant will be extended to allow colleges to make progress in respect of accommodation. ATU will also receive part of the €1 million for technological universities to bring in capacity to plan for its student accommodation. If we are serious about regional development - and the Deputy has a strong record on this - bringing accommodation into the region is important. Having student accommodation in the technological universities is going to be key to their success. They have not been able to borrow a bean up until now to do that. We have changed the borrowing framework in order that they can. This week, we have provided them with money to prepare their plans for submission to us in 2023 to either build or provide student accommodation next year. I hear what the Deputy said regarding the STEM building. I will keep in close contact with him on that.
