asked the Minister for Education why students residing in the State and wishing to attend a university in the State cannot get a third-level education grant because they were educated in Northern Ireland and received honours in O and A levels which equate to the leaving certificate.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Higher Education Grants.
10.
The legal position in relation to the grants under the Local Authorities (Higher Education Grants) Act, 1968, is that they can be awarded only on the results of the leaving certificate examination.
Is the Minister aware that on the leaving certificate results the grant is refused to otherwise qualified students because they were late in applying in their first year at the school? Is this a regulation which the Minister must stand on?
I am carrying out the regulations under the 1968 Act.
Is the Minister aware that in some counties, specifically Donegal and Louth, there is a tradition of attendance at second-level schools in the Six Counties? Would the Minister not consider changing the regulations so that the sons and daughters of citizens of this country who go to school in the tradition of this area may avail of the programme of grants?
Special arrangements were made at the inception of the scheme for a limited period in order to enable pupils to avail themselves of these facilities. It was not intended that it should be continued thereafter since students who attend junior-level post-primary schools in Northern Ireland, by transferring to schools under the Department in 1968 or later, could sit for the leaving certificate in the ordinary way from 1970 onwards and qualify for the grants.
Surely the Minister will agree that the statement he has just made is far too facile. Does the Minister not agree that when young men or women start a course in a particular school, with certain subject patterns and so on, it is impossible at times to break off and change to another school?
I do not wish to comment on the suggestion that it was facile. This is the scheme which was introduced in 1968 and it has obtained down to the present date.
Could I have an answer to the question: will the Minister consider the case of pupils from the Border counties who find themselves in this position? They are citizens of the Republic. They go to schools which have been used traditionally by their families and they are being legislated against.
It would be open to students to sit for the leaving certificate examination down here as extern pupils and, if they got the necessary results, they would be eligible for grants provided they were not excluded on the basis of being nonresidents of the State. I would remind the Deputy that these grants are administered by the local authorities and are open only to pupils whose parents reside in the local authority area.
Would the Minister say——
I have given a lot of latitude on this question. I want to pass on to another question.
——that there is an educational reason for this way of dealing with the problem?
It is not a question of an educational reason.
I thought it was not.
It is confined to residents of the counties involved.
I would ask the Minister to give very serious consideration to what Deputy Wilson has said about having a look at this again and perhaps reverting to what was regarded as only a transitional situation. There are boarding schools in the Six Counties to which traditionally members of particular parts of the communities in the Border counties have gone. This is particularly so in the case of Donegal and also in other counties.