Madam, - I read with interest that Minister for Education Batt O'Keeffe has personally backed the return of third-level tuition fees ( The Irish Times, September 10th). Putting the substantive issue of college fees aside, this marks a worrying development in how Ireland is to be governed during the coming economic difficulties.
Justifying his view, and questioning the current method of funding the third-level sector, Mr O'Keeffe cites a recent Bank of Ireland survey, which found there were 33,000 millionaires in Ireland. This is hardly reason enough to burden the majority of the population with college fees or any extra indirect taxation. His allusion to the number of millionaires is unsettling. Is it the mindset of the current Government as the state coffers empty that everyone should suffer because some people are rich? - Yours, etc,
JACK Ó LEOCHÁIN,
Toronto,
Canada.
Madam, - Perhaps, as Batt O'Keeffe put on his best horrified tone when he announced that Ireland was now home to 33,000 millionaires, he might have noted another figure from the Bank of Ireland Wealth Survey: the one stating that total household debt in Ireland has increased by €27 billion.
Something he might also consider is the latest result from the EU Survey of Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC), showing 720,770 people at risk of poverty, in addition to the 292,550 living in consistent poverty.
Finally, as I was writing this, my attention was drawn to the page 7 article about the OECD's Education at a Glance 2008report, showing that Ireland has one of the lowest levels of educational investment in the developed world, spending a mere 4.6 per cent of its wealth on education, which barely ranks us above Greece and Slovakia.
This year I became eligible to return to college as a mature student, but decided to put my studies off for another year to get some more savings together. As one of the taxpayers Mr O'Keeffe claims to want to support, I would appreciate it if he could refrain from taking the goal I've been working my way towards for the past five years and tossing it out the window - which is exactly what he'll be doing with the shameful reintroduction of college fees. - Yours, etc,
PÁDRAIG FAGAN,
Arthur Griffith Park,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.