Sir, – Jennifer O’Connell writes well about the chronic issues facing students looking for somewhere affordable to live when studying away from home (“If Normal People’s Connell got his place in Trinity now, he’d be paying €287 a week”, Opinion & Analysis, September 3rd). She suggests solutions like abolishing the €3,000 student fees, or increasing the amount given in grants, but unfortunately these solutions will merely increase the prices that landlords will charge as they soak up some or all of this additional cash. The solution, rather, is to increase the amount of State-owned accommodation for students. Your columnist mentions two accommodation projects of universities which have been mothballed due to rising costs. Unlike private providers which must generate a profit, State-owned accommodation merely has to break even. Modern buildings, built correctly to today’s standards, should have a life of at least 100 years or more. This is the payback period that should be calculated into the costings of break-even with these two student accommodation projects, rather than the 40 years currently used by Government. As the universities are unlikely to be relocating to anywhere different in the future, it makes sense for the State to step in where private industry cannot, or will not, provide sufficient accommodation in the long term. Student accommodation will always be needed. It seems to be the ideology of “private sector all good, public sector bad” which is preventing this.
The Government should to work out the needs of future student accommodations, actually build student accommodation for the long term, and finally fix one aspect of the accommodation crisis for good. – Yours, etc,
DAVID DORAN,
Bagenalstown,
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Co Carlow.