Free schoolbooks extended to Leaving Cert and free meals for all primary pupils from next year

More than 200,000 families are set to benefit from the extension of free schoolbooks worth about €740 to Leaving Cert students next year.
It means families with students in transition year, fifth year and sixth year will not have to pay for textbooks, copybooks and other resources from September 2025. The measure will apply to non-fee charging second level schools only.
Budget 2025 also extends the free hot school meals programme to all 3,000-plus primary schools from next year.
The measure, currently available in about 2,200 primary schools, will benefit an estimated 200,000 additional pupils.
There will also be “holiday hunger” pilot scheme to provide meals during the summer to less well-off students.
It forms part of a wider €11.8 billion Department of Education budget for 2025.
The bulk of this funding will go on pay, which will increase with the hiring of an additional 1,600 special needs assistants and 768 additional teachers for special education.
They will work to support children with additional needs at primary and second level as part of moves to create a more inclusive education system.
There is also additional funding (€52 million) for the school transport scheme, which includes an increase in the grant rate for special transport and new pilot projects.
There will, by contrast, be a relatively modest increase in school capitation funding (€10 million), while a similar sum (€9 million) is being set aside to support schools to enforce mobile phone bans at second level, such as secure pouches for the storage of devices.
More than €1 billion will go towards the delivery of more than 330 school building projects to cater to a growing school-age population, especially at second level.
At third level, meanwhile, last year’s “one-off” €1,000 cut to third level student registration fee is being extended into the new academic year.
This brings the maximum charge for undergraduate students to €2,000 for about 100,000 higher education students.
In addition, income thresholds for the student grant scheme and the part-time fee scheme will be increased, while there will be a €1,000 increase in the post graduate tuition fee contribution for student grant recipients.
Funding will also increase the level of stipend paid to most PhD students from €22,000 to €25,000 annually, a move long sought by campaigners.
There is also a “once-off” reduction of 33 per cent in the contribution fee for 14,000 apprentices in higher education.
It forms part of a wider €4.5 billion budget for the Department of Further and Higher Education, an increase of about €400 million on last year.
In a move long sought by universities, the Government will tap into a huge surplus in the National Training Fund – paid via a levy on employers – to create a €1.5 billion funding package between now and 2030.
This will boost core funding to higher education by an additional €150 million per year by 2030. About €50 million of this additional core funding is due in 2025.
Minister for Further and Higher Education Patrick O’Donovan said: “This is something the higher education sector has been crying out for, and Government has listened.”
Funding will also go to progress over 1,200 student beds in regional universities, as well as “unlocking” about 1,000 student bed in projects at Maynooth University, DCU and UCD.
There was a mixed response to the measures. The Irish Universities Association welcomed the funding package but noted that it did not fully close a funding gap identified by government in 2022.
The Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) said it “beggared belief” that more funding had been allocated for mobile phone pouches than to increasing funds for cash-strapped schools, while the Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) said it did little to address underinvestment and unrestored cutbacks.