FIANNA FÁIL's Coalition partners and the Opposition parties have all come out strongly against Minister for Education Batt O'Keeffe's proposal to reintroduce third-level fees for the better-off.
Progressive Democrats leader Senator Ciarán Cannon - differing from PD Minister for Health Mary Harney - said his party had pledged in the last election that third-level fees would not be reintroduced, while the Greens insisted that there was no commitment in the programme for the Government to bring in fees.
Mr O'Keeffe said he intended to have a "forensic audit" of the €2 billion spent annually on third-level education before making any detailed proposals and he insisted that only the better off would have to pay if fees were reintroduced.
Fine Gael education spokesman Brian Hayes said the Minister had gazumped a third-level review group he had set up to study the issue and report in the autumn. "At this stage we cannot be sure if this U-turn in Fianna Fáil policy is simply the Minister for Education flying a kite à la Noel Dempsey some years ago," Mr Hayes said.
"However, all three Government parties went into the last election stating their unequivocal opposition to the reintroduction of fees and this is copperfastened in the programme for government."
He added that he opposed the reintroduction of fees and maintained that their abolition by the Fine Gael-led rainbow coalition in 1995 had resulted in a sharp increase in third-level participation among lower-income groups.
"The reintroduction of college fees by Fianna Fáil would be the most socially retrograde policy measure in a generation. This is not about fairness. This is not about reform. This is simply about asking working Irish families to stump up for the incompetence of Fianna Fáil in managing the public finances."
Labour Party education spokesman Ruairí Quinn said his party would oppose tooth and nail any attempt to reintroduce fees.
"Over the past few weeks we have heard a steadily rising chorus of calls for the reintroduction of fees, from university presidents and others, and it appears from comments made by Minister Batt O'Keeffe that the Government is now about to capitulate to the pressure," said Mr Quinn.
He said the abolition of third-level fees was one of Labour's most significant achievements in government and it opened up third-level education to tens of thousands of students from low- and middle-income families.
"At a time when we want to encourage more students to enter third level, it would be short-sighted and short-termist to respond to the funding crisis by imposing what would essentially be a tax on those hoping to get a degree," Mr Quinn said.
Sinn Féin education spokesman Senator Pearse Doherty said his party opposed the reintroduction of fees. "Education is a right, not a privilege," he said.