Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 21 February 2024
154. Deputy Peter Burke asked the Minister for Health the reason a student nurse (details supplied) is not entitled to the accommodation allowance to facilitate their work placement; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8172/24]
View answerAs the Deputy may be aware, following approval by Government on 13 December 2022, I was pleased to announce €9 million in additional supports for student nurses and midwives. €5.4m of this funding provides for an enhanced Travel and Subsistence Scheme for eligible students in publicly funded undergraduate nursing and midwifery courses while attending their supernumerary clinical practice placements. Supernumerary students in midwifery, general, combined children's and general, intellectual disability and psychiatric nursing all have the same entitlement.
The Department of Health Circular 4/2023 issued to the HSE on 27 February 2023, set out the revised arrangements.The scheme provides a targeted and more equitable approach to supporting these students and two of it's main features are:
• a new rate of €80 for overnight accommodation along with an increased weekly cap of €300, (for those eligible supernumerary students who require accommodation away from their normal place of residence while attending practice placements)
• supernumerary students on the undergraduate nursing/midwifery programme continue to be entitled to claim for payment of travel expenses necessarily incurred while attending placements, on the basis of receipts provided by the student and certified by the Student Allocation Liaison Officer (SALO) in the clinical partner site. Public transport should be used wherever possible. Where public transport is not available and the use of private transport is necessary to attend placements, a supernumerary student is entitled to claim for payment of these necessarily incurred travel expenses. These should be paid on the same basis as that which applies generally in the public sector.
As individual cases in individual sites are the responsibility of the HSE, I have asked the HSE to respond directly to the Deputy on this matter.
