The Irish Universities Association, representing Ireland’s seven research-intensive universities, shares key objectives with AMLÉ (Aontas na Mac Léinn in Éirinn), as the representative body of Ireland’s university students.
In particular, we endorse AMLÉ’s call for further action to close the funding gap affecting the sector, which the Government itself acknowledged as far back as 2022. The deficit then was over 300m euros. Four years later, it remains in real terms over 250m euros, given (welcome but unfunded) growth in student numbers, pay and non-pay inflation and unfunded pay awards. This is holding us back.
As we said in our pre-Budget Submission, “there is a clear choice on Budget Day – act decisively to close the funding gap, supporting students of all ages, or risk eroding the capacity, quality and competitiveness of our third-level sector”.
With respect to the AMLÉ call to abolish the Student Contribution Charge, the IUA supports measures to make education more affordable, particularly for students and families most in need, as reflected in the Programme for Government.
What is crucial however, is that any reduction to the student contribution does not come at the expense of funding to the sector itself. That would be robbing Peter to pay Paul. As things stand, the State provides less money per student in real terms now to universities than it did in 2008. A recent article by our University Chairs spells this out.
We also share AMLÉ’s concern about the lack of progress in providing urgently needed new student accommodation. As we promised in our reaction to the publication of the Government’s new Strategy, we are engaging with government, investors and developers to see whether, as conceived, the Strategy can provide the affordable and viable accommodation students require, given the wider challenges facing housing and construction in Ireland as a whole.
The AMLÉ protest on 1 October comes a few days before Budget 27, which we hope will be a decisive moment for government support to Higher Education. In a world where a small economy like ours cannot influence much and has to accept a lot, what we can – and must – control is how much we invest in our people, particularly but not only young people, and their education, up-skilling and reskilling.
With AMLÉ, we look to government to give us the resources to meet this crucial challenge and to future proof our economy and societyfor the year ahead of us.
Paul Johnston, Director-General, Irish Universities Association
Ends.