Literacy is a fundamental necessity, says Lord Mayor

Ireland will not be a true democracy until adult literacy levels are improved, the Lord Mayor of Dublin has said.

Ms Mary Freehill was speaking at the opening of the National Forum on Adult Education at Dublin Castle.

She told the participants that literacy was "a fundamental necessity, without which we cannot participate in public life. We cannot have real democracy in a country where 25 per cent of the adult population have limited literacy skills".

Ms Freehill described adult education as "a wonderfully liberating experience" and said the sector was "no longer the Cinderella at the education ball" but rather "a major pillar of the education system".

Yesterday's forum was organised by the Department of Education as the final part of a consultation process before the Government publishes a White Paper on adult education.

The principal administrator in the education, employment, labour and social affairs directorate of the OECD, Prof Alan Wagner, told the forum that participation in adult education and training in the State was below the OECD average.

The Republic also had a lower than average proportion of adults who have completed secondary school. Just half of Irish people aged 25 to 64 had finished secondary education, compared to a 60 per cent attainment rate for the OECD as a whole. Some 11 per cent had "at least university qualifications" compared to 13 per cent for the OECD as a whole.

As a result, a significant proportion of the population "lack the knowledge and skills needed to confront the complex challenges of the modern world", Prof Wagner said.

The age profile of Ireland's university entrants was also heavily "youth oriented". Some 80 per cent of entrants were no older than 20. There was a "striking" contrast with New Zealand and the UK, where universities "cater to a much wider age band" and one in five people who enter college do so after the age of 27.

The Minister of State at the Department of Education and Science, Mr Willie O'Dea, said the reforms in adult education would "make Ireland a more just and inclusive society". He said policy in the sector would be influenced by the requirements of industry but also by "the need to support a more equitable and democratic society where all citizens can participate fully in social, economic and cultural life".

The principal officer of the further education section of the Department of Education, Ms Margaret Kelly, said that while the November 1998 Green Paper on adult education had met with an "overwhelmingly positive response", the paper had been criticised for being "too focused on economic and labour market needs".