Abuses by immigrants from other EU countries have led to changes in the back-to-education allowance scheme, the Dáil has been told.
The Minister for Social and Family Affairs has changed the rules so that a person must be unemployed for 15 months rather than the original six before being eligible for the allowance when applying to a third-level college. Ms Coughlan said: "We are paying for people from other EU countries".
She added: "They make themselves unemployed and come over to Ireland for six months for the craic. They apply for the back-to-education scheme to which they are entitled because they are EU citizens, but that is not what the scheme is for."
She said there would be no changes in the six-month eligibility for people seeking a second-level qualification.
"Time spent pursuing a second-level course with the assistance of the back-to-education scheme will count towards meeting the 15-month qualification condition for the third-level option."
But Fine Gael's spokesman Mr Michael Ring pointed out that the scheme was affecting only 1,200 people and costs a mere €2.2 million.
He said if the Minister for Finance wanted to tax the bloodstock industry he would "take in 100 times that figure".
