asked the Minister for Education the reason she will not lay a copy of rules she has made in respect of the manner of calculation of means for higher education grant purposes before Dáil Eireann but is prepared to furnish them privately to an individual Deputy.
Written Answers. - Higher Education Grants.
313.
The documents in question were furnished directly to the Deputy as a matter of convenience to him. These documents are generally available from my Department and local authorities. I am arranging to have copies placed in the Dáil Library.
314.
asked the Minister for Education if she agrees that the present system of recouping local authorities in the following year for the previous year's financial expenditure on higher education grants gives local authorities a financial incentive, from the point of view of minimisation of interest charges, to delay the actual payment of the grants to the latest feasible time within the previous year.
Since the introduction of the higher education grants scheme in 1968, payments have been made to the local authorities on the basis of recouping them as early as possible in the following year for the previous financial year's expenditure on higher education grants.
The higher education grants scheme requires, with regard to the payment of grants by local authorities, that the appropriate lecture fee be paid by the relevant local authority in advance of registration to the institution concerned in respect of eligible students, on receipt of invoice for the lecture fee from the appropriate third-level college; and that the local authority shall pay the maintenance element (if any) of a grant-holder's grant in three equal instalments, as early as possible in each term.