Today, third level students throughout the State are staging a walkout from lectures. I send solidarity and support to these students and their families. I wish to acknowledge the work done by the Union of Students in Ireland, USI, and all of the student unions. Students are weary and they are at their wits' end. This is not a decision they have taken lightly. They have been forced into it by the Government's abject failure to stand up for students. Students are very much under pressure. Too many are sleeping in cars or on sofas or commuting exhausting journeys because there simply is not enough accommodation; PhD researchers are pushed to the brink of their finances without a living wage or decent conditions and Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, grants are in dire need of reform.

The student housing crisis should shame the Government. The whole calamity in this regard is that the number of students who need accommodation is entirely predictable. It is not good enough for Ministers to act surprised every September. Indeed, it is apt that the walkout today was at 11:11 a.m. because the Tánaiste's party has been in government for 11 years and the problem has got worse after each of those years.

Despite all of the handwringing of Government Deputies, this year's budget is the third consecutive budget from this Government without an allocation for student accommodation. The Fine Gael Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science has passed the buck to the Fianna Fáil Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage - a Minister who has not even met student representatives to discuss the crisis. Someone needs to take responsibility. Students are paying the price each and every day.

Let me tell the Tánaiste what the Government's failure to deliver student accommodation means for ordinary students. One student told me that being unable to secure accommodation has meant the student must commute two and a half hours each way. This student's mental health has suffered immensely due to anxiety. Another student told us of a six-hour commute each day to reach UCD from Offaly and that students knows of lads travelling from Longford daily. The student is in final year but cannot face it and will defer. A PhD researcher said that, out of the €1,500 per month stipend, €1,000 each month goes towards accommodation and that researcher is left eating beans on toast at every meal. The researcher's mental health has been severely impacted and they are considering quitting their programme and leaving the country.

The housing crisis the Government has caused is devastating people's lives and is impacting on student education. However, it does not have to be this way. We need capital investment to unlock the 3,000 student college-owned beds that the Government has allowed to sit on the shelf. This must happen without delay. Sinn Féin allocated €81 million in additional capital investment to get these shovel-ready projects on site and under construction. Will the Tánaiste commit to allocating the necessary investment?

Students and parents must be recognised as renters like any other and, yet, they are being unfairly excluded from the rent tax rebate. Will the Tánaiste find a way to include them in the rent tax credit? PhD researchers are also excluded because they are denied worker's status. Will the Tánaiste end this unfairness and include them in this rebate? Students have been failed for far too long on the watch of the Tánaiste's Government. Will he end this unfairness and tackle the student crisis, once and for all, to let the students of this country get on with their education and careers?

Too many people are being excluded. When I talk to universities and colleges, they tell me about the hundreds of students who are on their accommodation waiting lists. That does not even include the students who have not even left their homes or have decided to defer until next year. This is totally wrong on many levels. Students need the support of this Government.

The rise in the cost of living is affecting everyone and it is affecting students too. We understand that. We get that. Students want their voices heard and, by protesting today, they are making sure that their voices are heard. They will be heard in this House and by this Government.

I will give the Deputy a few examples of what we have announced only in the past few weeks, such as a reduction in college fees by €1,000 this year and by €500 on a permanent basis from next year and we intend to build on that in the years ahead. There will be a one-off increase in the student grant before Christmas which will put more money back in students' pockets; a 10% to 14% increase in the student grant from January and eligibility for the student grant is being widened in order that approximately 15,000 students, who do not currently qualify for a grant, will qualify for one next year.

We have also reduced the cost of public transport for students by up to 50% and more purpose-built student accommodation will be built in the next months and years. The four things we are doing to help students with the cost of living are cutting the student fee, increasing the student grant, reducing the cost of public transport and building more purpose-built student accommodation, which is desperately needed, as the Deputy rightly points out.

It is worth saying that we have more students in Ireland now than ever before. That is very positive. This generation of school leavers is more likely to receive third-level education and further and higher education than any generation that has gone before it. It is also more likely to be in employment and, as we know from migration statistics, more Irish citizens return every year than leave. That has been the case for a number of years.

Like all sectors of society, students are very much suffering when it comes to the impact of the housing crisis and very high rents. We absolutely acknowledge that.

With regard to the question that the Deputy raised on student accommodation, the Minister, Deputy Harris, is taking the lead on this. He has the authority of the Government to do so in co-operation, of course, with the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. Hundreds of student accommodation places are under construction at present of which 600 alone are located not too far away from the Deputy in the University of Galway.

The Minister, Deputy Harris, is putting together a financial package to help unlock student accommodation developments, where permission is granted but they cannot proceed, because they are not financially viable. He is putting together financial aid for universities, including technological universities, to unlock those developments and get them under construction within the next year. That will really help by providing more purpose-built student accommodation on campus. It must be done at affordable rates, because much of the student accommodation that exists, especially in this city, is extremely expensive.

The rent tax credit, as the Deputy is aware, is a credit of €500 per year per renter not per tenancy. If three or four people are sharing house, it will be up to €2,000. It applies to students where they are income tax payers but we acknowledge that in many cases, students do not earn enough to pay income tax and their parents are paying the rent for them. Therefore the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, is examining whether it is possible to extend the rent tax credit to parents who pay student fees on behalf of their children. We hope we can do that. Sometimes these things are easier promised than done but we hope we can do that and we should be in a position to confirm whether we can do it by next Tuesday, when the finance Bill comes to Cabinet.

That is welcome. The Minister, Deputy Harris, will be in the Dáil to answer questions next week and I hope he will acknowledge that, because parents paying for students' rent should be entitled to the credit. Rent is rent at the end of the day.

What is disappointing is we can predict accurately, based on the number of babies born today, how many students are going to need accommodation in 19 or 20 years' time. There must be an acknowledgement of the failure there and we must learn from it. It is inevitable there must be a capital investment to make the 3,000-plus beds financially viable and that needs to be done sooner rather than later. This Government is very good at looking at things but I ask for immediate action on behalf of the students who are out protesting today. I acknowledge the great work they have done to stand up for themselves but we in this House must also stand up for them and hear what they are saying. Their families are under pressure and they are under pressure and it must stop.

I am not sure that is entirely true. If we rewound to 20 years ago, when neither my party nor that of the Deputy was in government, and projected ahead, I doubt we would have projected the population of the country would be 5.2 million, as it is now. I doubt we would have projected we would have extended the opportunity of higher and further education to so many as we do now. I am thankful to say more people are accessing higher and further education than was ever the case before. They are doing so from a wider and more diverse range of backgrounds, especially non-traditional ones, than was ever the case before. Those are really good things but they have resulted in a shortage of student accommodation. We acknowledge that and that we must deal with it. One of the ways we are going to deal with that is by providing financial aid to universities and technological universities to unlock some of those purpose-built student accommodation developments so they can go ahead. The Minister, Deputy Harris, is working on that as we speak.