THE Ministers for Further Education, Research, Innovation and Science and Housing, Planning & Heritage have welcomed the issuing of a Department of Housing circular in relation to student accommodation.
The circular issued on Friday night to all city and county councils and pointed to the critical need for purpose-built student accommodation to be available to meet the needs of students in third level education.
The circular issued confirmed student accommodation should not be used for residential accommodation of a permanent nature and should be safeguarded for use by students and other persons related to higher education institutes during the academic year.
Minister O’Brien stated, “Myself and the Minister for Further Education have been liaising on the issue of student accommodation generally and we have introduced safeguards to protect students in rented accommodation. The recently issued circular leaves local authorities in no doubt as to how I feel local authorities need to treat requests for change of use for purpose built student accommodation.
I will continue to monitor this situation to ensure that local authorities protect and ensure that purpose built accommodation continues to be used for the purpose that it was provided for.”
Minister of State Niall Collins said: “Student accommodation should be safeguarded for students during the academic year. I want to thank my colleagues Minister Harris and O’Brien for issuing this circular. My Department continues to work with the Union of Students of Ireland on this and other measures to assist students.”
The two Departments will host a meeting of Universities over the coming days to discuss the issue of student accommodation generally.
