We are just a few days away from the referendum on Saturday and we should use the opportunity today to encourage as many people as possible to come out and vote. Most Members of parties - and those of no affiliation - are supporting a "Yes" vote, believing it is very important and in the interests of our children. It is important that the turnout is high on Saturday and that there is a resounding "Yes" vote.

Will the Leader raise the issue of student support grants with the Minister for Education and Skills? There are just under 50,000 grant applications for this education year and some 46,000 have not yet been processed. Students do not know whether they will receive a student support grant. I understand the Minister has set up a hotline but it is not intended for students who might be able to telephone to ask about the position of his or her application. The hotline is for Oireachtas Members. While all of us would welcome this facility and would wish to assist students in getting word on where their grant application stands, the Minister should not restrict this hotline to Members. There should be a proper hotline which students can use to ask about their application. This is the end of the second week in November and 46,000 students still have no word on their third level student support grants.

I need not remind Members that the Minister for Education and Skills signed, on 21 February 2011, a pledge with the Union of Students in Ireland, USI, and students in general, stating he would oppose and campaign against any new form of third level fees, including student loans, graduate taxes and any further increases in student contribution. We knew that was a blatant lie at the time, and continues to be so given that this Government has stated it will increase the student registration fee to €3,000, having already increased it by €250 last year. Not only is the student registration fee being increased but now students cannot access their grant applications. It is very serious. There is a minimum of 46,000 applications pending; there has already been a very high refusal rate and the Government has also abolished postgraduate student grants.

Will the Leader schedule some time for discussing this matter? It will not be fixed in the coming week, as is patently obvious by the numbers outstanding. The Minister should attend the House and explain what is being done. Let us not forget it was the Government which decided to remove the grant application process from the local authorities in order to streamline the process. Obviously this streamlining has not worked. We need to give some certainty to our students as to when their applications will be processed. It appears to me that applications for 2012 will not even be looked at before the turn of the year. Most of us do not see that as an acceptable situation. Will the Leader ask the Minister to come to the House in the coming weeks and outline how his Department envisages working through this self-created backlog of 46,000 outstanding applications?

We are only two days from the children's rights referendum and I reiterate how important it is to see a high turnout on Saturday and strong support for the "Yes" side. Many of us have spent a lot of time canvassing. I was canvassing outside schools only this morning. There is strong support for the "Yes" side, recognition that the referendum wording is carefully balanced and that it is very important to place protection of children's rights into the Constitution. However, given how much support there is, it is important not to descend into complacency and that we continue to urge people to come out and vote. It is also important to have a high turnout because this is the first time a Saturday vote has been tried for a very long time. This is something we have been seeking for many years in order to enable more people to vote, allowing students in particular and others living away from home to return and vote where they are registered. It is really important to have that high turnout and I welcome the high levels of canvassing for a "Yes" vote by colleagues from all parties.

I, too, would like a debate on education issues. The Minister for Education and Skills was very clear on radio that the streamlining of student grant application process through SUSI should lead to great improvements in the system. There used to be enormous delays in the old system run by the councils. The Minister pointed out that although it is regrettable that many people are still waiting for their applications to be processed nonetheless there is an improvement on the old system where considerable delays were built in.

There was encouraging news this morning that all colleagues should welcome, indicating that increasing numbers of young people are staying on in secondary schools to leaving certificate level. The increase is important and very significant. The number of students staying in school to complete second level is at the highest ever rate, at more than 90%. The percentage of those who sit the leaving certificate is at 90.2%, and in DEIS schools there has been a greatly increased retention rate, from 68% in 2001 to more than 80% in 2006. It is very welcome news and we should be cognisant of that when we have a debate on education.

Many colleagues in the House spoke yesterday on the topic of family planning clinics, with some looking for an inquiry. Allegations concerning certain family planning clinics were published in one newspaper and there is an ongoing investigation into those. Clearly, if any practice was engaged in that was against the law or damaging to women's health, that is a very serious matter. However, there is a broader context. Clinics operating entirely outside the law, meaning those that do not offer non-directive counselling and are therefore not regulated under the Regulation of Information Act, have in the past been the subject of both allegations in newspapers and of High Court proceedings. These last concerned practices that sought to use very forceful tactics to bully women into taking certain courses of action, in one case to enter into an illegal adoption. In this country we have had a history of failing to recognise our responsibility, as legislators, to women in crisis pregnancy. I am very hopeful that when the ABC group reports we will finally face up to our responsibilities, at very least to those women who face a life-threatening condition as a result of their pregnancy, and to women whose pregnancies show fatal foetal abnormalities. Currently these women are not treated with any compassion.