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4 YEAR SETBACK FOR GALWAY STUDENT APPEAL AGAINST GRANTS VERDICT
A planned appeal from a Galway student against a high court verdict on cuts to the higher education maintenance grant scheme in budget 2011, has encountered a serious delay.
A notice of intent to appeal was served in May last year on behalf of NUIG Arts student Medb McCarthy and Dundalk IT student Robert Johnson after their legal challenge was defeated in April.
However the student body has since been advised that the appeal process could take some time.
Antoinette Giblin reports:
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The students had initially sought the judicial review on two grounds.
They argud that they had a legitimate expectation that they would continue to receive the non-adjacent rate of the grant and that the Minister had breached Section 6 of the Student Support Act 2011.
However, the ruling by Mr Justice Hedigan in favour of the Minister and the Department found that grant cuts were in the public interest given the dire financial circumstances facing the country at the time.
However following its notice of intent to appeal, the Union of Students of Ireland has since been advised that there would be a four to five year wait to have such an appeal heard in the Supreme Court due to a backlog of cases.
A spokesperson for the USI says efforts to have it treated as a priority case have so far been unsuccessful.
Incoming USI president Joe O’Connor is currently finishing out his term as Chief of GMIT SU.
He says the delay means that while it may not have a tangible benefit on the education of the two students in question, he hopes to look into ways of expediting the appeal during his time in office as a matter of principle.