In Galway over 750 students and parents queue for hours in a bid to find accommodation for the academic year ahead.
Exam season is over but for thousands of students and their parents, the test of finding student accommodation is equally challenging. The single biggest expense for the majority of students who live away from their family home in order to attend college is rented accommodation. There is an additional fear that thousands of returning college students will not be able to find, or afford suitable places to live for the year ahead.
Students queue outside the Galway Advertiser premises to buy the annual accommodation list. Then the annual scramble to find accommodation begins in earnest as over 750 students armed with phone numbers and addresses traverse Galway city in the hope of finding somewhere to live.
For Kieran Durcan from Ballina in County Mayo, the escalation in rents from one year to the next is a big issue. His rent has gone up by 50 per cent. Another student worries she will not be able to find somewhere to live at all. She is annoyed that,
I'm at the mercy of whatever I have to pay to study here.
Students' Union President of the National University of Ireland, Galway (NUI Galway) Leona Byrne points out that between NUIG and Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology (GMIT) there are 20,000 students. Of these, 70% are living away from home.
What we’re calling from the government is on campus purpose built accommodation for students.
Until then, students are facing higher registration fees and higher rents.
An RTÉ News report broadcast on 21 August 2002. The reporter is Jim Fahy.
