'I don’t know anyone who hasn’t had to skip meals': Students in Cork going to lectures hungry due to rising costs of living

Hundreds of UCC students have said that they had to cut down on food, heating, healthcare or sanitary products to save money, with more than one in four saying they often go to lectures hungry.

A ‘Cost of Living Report’, compiled by the University College Cork Students’ Union, and launched yesterday at the university asked over 3,000 participants if they had cut back on expenditure due to cost-of-living increases.

The more common categories on which respondents cut back spending are luxury items, clothes, going on holidays and socialising, with just 6% of respondents stating that they did not cut back their spending.

However, more than one quarter of those surveyed (28%) said that they have gone to lectures hungry. Meanwhile, 29% said they have had to cut back on healthcare such as going to the GP or dentist with 10% of students reporting cutting down on sanitary products. Just over one quarter (26%) said they had cut down on heating.

One respondent said: “I don’t know anyone who hasn’t had to skip meals or turn off the heating to get by. Everyone is trying to get extra hours at work even during exams just to survive.”

Another said: “I can say personally I have been incapable of having a normal student life due to having to work to survive”.

They added that have missed academic and social events: “I have had to work so much to afford rent and food and in doing so have been forced to miss deadlines and perform poorly due to missing lectures.”

SKIPPING MEALS

A third respondent said: “I found last year I could afford to get groceries that would last me the whole week and this year I can only afford food/dinners to last four-five days if I’m willing to skip meals.”

Less than half agreed that they had sufficient money to cover essential living expenses, with more than two thirds of all respondents agreeing or strongly agreeing that the cost of living negatively affects their health and wellbeing.

Students called for more support from both the government and the university, calling for the government to put caps on rent price particularly in designated student accommodation buildings and enable better access to grants such as SUSI.

They suggested the university could offer more affordable food options on campus and a less strict criteria in the food bank, less requirements to buy expensive textbooks for twelve week modules or more rental schemes for books and laptops, subsidised stationary and free sanitary products.

Students’ Union President Katie Haplin Hill said the report “captures the reality of what it means to be a student today”.

“It demonstrates the extent of student poverty and highlights the most prevalent challenges facing students daily,” she added.

Asked by reporters in Cork yesterday if he was concerned by the findings of the report, in particular that 28% of recipients said they had gone to lectures hungry, Tánaiste Micheál Martin, said he would like to study the contents of the report.

“28% is a very high figure and I’m not clear in the modern day era that people need to be going to third level hungry. We have increased the levels of supports for third level grants, in particular,” he said.

“The cost of accommodation is high and the cost of accommodation is a problem. In Cork, there’s been a fairly significant acceleration of student accommodation unlike other areas but there still is huge pressure on students.”

The Cost of Living Report was compiled in association with Dr Declan Jordan from Cork University Business School with the support of UCC ACCESS, for the UCC Students Charges & Fees Forum.