Budget's €34m in student supports will make third level more affordable, says minister

Higher education minister James Lawless has defended the €34m student support package in Budget 2027.

A €34m package of student supports unveiled in Budget 27 will make third-level education more affordable and accessible, according to higher education minister James Lawless, although student representatives gave the measures a mixed reception.

The package includes a €150 reduction in the student contribution charge, bringing the annual fee down to €2,350.

Additional supports are also being provided through the SUSI grant scheme. Maintenance grants are to increase by 4%, while families with more than one child attending college could see their student contribution costs fall by up to €1,300 a year.

Mr Lawless said the measures were designed to ease the "real strain" being experienced by students and their families amid continuing cost-of-living pressures.

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Daniel Walsh, president of Aontas na Mac Léinn in Éirinn (AMLE), the national students' union body, said the reduction in the student contribution fee was welcome, but a 6% drop was “extremely disappointing”.

“Students in Ireland are still facing one of the most expensive educations anywhere in the European Union,” Mr Walsh told the Irish Examiner.

“We need to see real commitments from this Government to more substantial reductions in the fee across future budget packages, with the ambition and an eye to the complete abolition within life by the governments.” 

AMLE president Daniel Walsh. Picture: Tommy Clancy

More than a thousand third-level students protested in Dublin on October 1, calling for a €500 drop in the student contribution fee.

Students have also demanded a levelling out of a perceived funding gap for universities. In 2022, the Government acknowledged a €300m funding deficit in the sector in 2022.

Speaking at an Oireachtas committee on further education, DCU chief financial officer John Kilcoyne claimed an accumulated deficit of €780m had arisen over the past four years.

The deficit has affected the delivery of on-campus student accommodation. The same Oireachtas committee heard that a planned 1,000-bed student accommodation centre in DCU became ‘untenable’ amid a lack of State support and rising construction costs.

“This budget package was supposed to be a budget for people who get up early every morning… it did basically nothing to support the thousands and thousands of students across the country who are getting up early every morning,” Mr Walsh said.

“They're getting up at five o'clock or six o'clock to begin an hours-long journey to their college campuses. And the reason they have to make that journey is that there's no student accommodation available.” 

Ireland is facing a shortfall of about 50,000 student accommodation beds, it is estimated.

A key element of the National Student Accommodation Strategy involves facilitating private developers to build student housing on university-owned land. 

Mr Walsh argued that approach risks leaving students dependent on commercially-driven providers.

Other measures in the higher education budget included increased apprenticeship funding, €50m in AI skills and workforce adaptation, and the expansion of healthcare education.