In the light of the most comprehensive and detailed speech of my colleague, Deputy FitzGerald, there is very little left for me to say in a general way about the Minister's speech. However, there are some items on which I should like to comment.
I must confess that I, too, have been most disappointed in the Minister's introductory speech on the Estimate. His speech was disappointing by reason of the fact that he refrained from outlining future Government policy in relation to the entire field of education, and he very cleverly refrained from any personal comment on certain important issues in relation to education, issues which have been very topical recently. Without reflecting on the Minister personally, I have noticed of late that education seems to be reverting to the half a century old tradition of being tied up with Civil Service red tape. A few years ago, under the direction of one of the Minister's predecessors, there was a breakaway from the Civil Service mentality in relation to education. I am greatly afraid the Minister has shown no signs of being imaginative or revolutionary in his views on education. I sincerely hope that the great ferment of opinion and discussion which started a few years ago will continue and that the development of education will not be restricted by the Civil Service.
I wish to quote a statement by the Minister at column 1319, volume 245, of the Official Report of Wednesday, 15th April, 1970:
The provision for grants for the colleges of the National University and Trinity College in 1970-71 has been made on the basis that the total income of the Colleges should be augmented by an increase of 25 per cent in the tuition fees.
The Minister tries to justify this by saying:
There has not been a general over-all increase in these fees since 1963-64 and having regard to the general improvement in salaries and incomes in recent years such an increase in tuition fees must be considered as moderate.
I want to protest very strongly against this substantial increase in student fees, and I fully support the case made by the Union of Students in Ireland to the Minister yesterday. I have here a statement of the views put forward to the Minister by the Union of Students. This major increase of 25 per cent in student fees is unjustifiable and indefensible. The Minister's decision is a retrograde step and represents a shortsighted policy in relation to the whole question of financing higher education. If this type of stop-gap measure is to be employed to finance higher education in the future, then one shudders to think what the outcome will be. I would appeal to the Minister to defer implementing this decision until the over-all situation regarding the financing of our future needs in higher education has been assessed and is fully known.
The Union of Students in Ireland, in a well documented case, have put forward various arguments against this sudden increase in fees, apart from the most obvious one, the almost intolerable burden which this increase will impose on the parents of many students who are attending college. It is noteworthy that a recent survey carried out by Monica Nevin in UCD, UCC, UCG and Trinity College shows that 73 to 74 per cent of the student population intended to work during the summer in order to help finance their courses at the university. It is a well-known fact, and I am sure every Deputy is aware of it. I am probably more conscious of this question of the cost of university education than most others because I secured my degree by attending college at night and working during the day. As I have said, the Minister should have second thoughts about this whole question.
Another important factor is that the differential in costs for different courses has now been widened. The fees for the arts course will be £244. The fees for the agricultural science course will go up from £450 to £562. Five hundred and sixty-two pounds is a lot of money for an agicultural science course. This sum does not include the extra cost of laboratory equipment, or the cost of accommodation which, as everyone knows, is very expensive in Dublin and other university centres. I am sure Deputies on all sides of the House are aware of the fact that a considerable number of students pursue university courses through great personal sacrifice on the part of their parents and by working during the holidays. I fully support the Union of Students in the case they have made to the Minister and as he is a reasonable man I hope he will accept their request and defer implementing this increase for a while.
I am in favour of greater participation by university students in the affairs of the university. University students, as a body, are probably the most maligned and misunderstood section of the community. This phenomenon is not peculiar to Ireland; it seems to be worldwide. I have considerable contact with university students and I want to go on record as saying that the vast majority of university students in this country are people of responsibility and idealism. Many students do a tremendous amount of social work and charitable work but unfortunately the long-haired weirdies get all the publicity even though they are a very small minority. While it might be presumptuous of me to speak authoritatively about university students, as there are two distinguished members of universities beside me, I want to state from my own contact with university students that I believe they are responsible people anxious to play a part in fashioning a university system which will meet the great challenge of the future. I believe it is vitally important that student potential should be tapped. The university authorities should endeavour to encourage maximum student participation at all levels of university life. I welcome the decision to appoint a student under-governing body in University College, Dublin. I hope the same thing will be done in other universities.
I became a Deputy in 1961 and when I first spoke on education in that year I advocated Limerick's claim for a university. Down through the years I continued to press the case for a university in Limerick. I welcome the developments which have brought about the establishment of a third level institute in Limerick. I trust this third level institute will be a full-scale university college with the same status as existing universities, with the same entrance standards and the same degree standards. The people of Limerick, who campaigned for so long and have been so successful in securing higher education facilities for their children, will co-operate in every possible way to ensure that this institute will live up to expectations.
It would be very remiss of me, as a Deputy representing Limerick city, not to pay tribute to the Limerick University Project Committee who have campaigned valiantly for the past decade for a university. This committee can now rest happy in the knowledge that their efforts have not merely been appreciated by the people in the region but have been recognised by the Minister and his Department.
I detest the description "third level institute" but we shall have to use this terminology until we can think of a better description. The concept of a technologically-orientated institution in Limerick is good, particularly in the light of the industrial developments that have taken place in the region. Whatever Cardinal Newman's concept of a university may have been we have to face the facts and recognise the technological revolution that has taken place and will continue to take place.
In certain areas higher education facilities have not been available and certain types of qualified personnel have had to be recruited from abroad to fill industrial posts while we, on the other hand, are exporting graduates in considerable numbers. The Minister referred to this in his speech and I agree basically with what he said but we must assess the situation now in the light of present and future needs. We must find out what types of graduates will be needed and then provide the necessary facilities to produce them.
Limerick college will fill a great need. I sincerely hope it will not become a narrow, specialist technological institution. From the information made available to us I understand there will be courses in arts, languages and the humanities.
I understand also that it is the intention, in conjunction with the Mary Immaculate Training College in Limerick, to provide a new type of degree course leading to a Bachelor of Education. This, again, is a very desirable development particularly logical in the light of what the Minister has said in relation to teacher training and the link up between the teacher training colleges and the universities. The new director of the college, Dr. Walsh, has, since his arrival in Limerick, made a tremendous impact down there. He is a highly qualified man but despite his qualifications and his wide experience he has not come into Limerick and tried to impose his will on the people. He has spent most of his time up to now on a fact finding mission and it is no harm to acknowledge the fact that he has consulted all interests, even local Deputies, with a view to finding out what particular types of course are necessary, what are the needs down there and what should be provided. The planning committee is at work at the moment and a site has been secured. It is the Minister's intention that the college will be ready to accept the first students in 1971. I sincerely hope everything will go according to plan and I look forward to the opening of this college. I want, again, to remind the Minister that the view of everybody in the Limerick region is that the college will become a fully recognised university institution.
There are some other points in the Minister's speech on which I should like to comment. By a strange coincidence I want to illustrate my points by certain developments that have been taking place in my constituency. Limerick is not the place that many people are led to believe it is. Certain other important educational developments have been taking place down there. Apart from the new third level institution, there is another rather new development in the field of education in Limerick. This is the new comprehensive school which is to be set up at Dooradoyle in co-operation with the Jesuit Fathers in Limerick. It will be known as the new Crescent comprehensive post-primary school. This is a rather unique development as it links one of the oldest teaching orders in the Church with the most advanced concept in post-primary education in modern times—the comprehensive system. This idea of the comprehensive school is a very good one. I certainly am fully in favour of it and I speak as a past pupil of Crescent College where I received most of my secondary education. This is a very good development and judging by the excellent series of articles which have been published recently in one of our daily newspapers by Father Morrissey who has been appointed director of the college, it holds out great hopes for the future of post-primary education in Limerick. There is one small point which I should like to bring to the Minister's notice in relation to the comprehensive school. It may be an academic point—and perhaps one would need to be an educationist to pronounce on it—but I shall just pass on to the Minister what the views of the people whose children will be attending the school are.
It has been traditional at the Crescent College to have a four-year course leading to the intermediate certificate. I understand that the Minister has been approached in this matter with a view to having a similar situation obtain in the new comprehensive school. While there may be mixed views on whether or not a three-year course to intermediate or a four-year course is the better, certainly in so far as the parents whose children will be attending this school are concerned there seems to be a desire that this traditional system of a four-year course should continue in the new comprehensive school. I understand that representations have been made to the Minister and I should like to add my voice in support of this.
I come now to another part of the Minister's speech—in fact, the opening part of it—which will lead me into the realms of controversy. I have to bring up again a case which was the subject here last November and October of several Dáil questions and which gave rise to much acrimony. The Minister says at column 1308 of the Official Report for Wednesday, 15th April, 1970:
Since the introduction of the policy of closing small schools the total number of schools has been reduced by 724. Of the number of schools closed 390 were one-teacher schools and 307 two-teacher schools. One hundred and ninety-three schools were closed during 1969, and the result of this reduced the total number of schools in operation on 31st December, 1969, to 4,144.
The Minister, having stated the actual statistical position, then goes on to express certain views regarding the closure of small schools. He says:
I would like here to pay tribute to the co-operation which I am receiving from managers, teachers and parents generally in the implementation of this policy. It is only the rare cases in which trouble arises that receive publicity: peaceful progress does not usually make headlines.
The Minister then goes on to outline the various advantages of amalgamation and the need for co-operation between parents, teachers and managers. Without going into the full details again and repeating the whole case, it is true that in many cases and, perhaps, in most cases, the decision to amalgamate and close down small schools has been accepted peacefully but there have been exceptions as the Minister has acknowledged. I am very conscious of this fact and the Minister must realise that his Department can make mistakes too.
When a row starts in a parish over the closure of a school, and when the full glare of publicity is focussed on it, the Minister must realise that his Department can make mistakes too. The case that hit the headlines perhaps more than any other, the case of the Montpelier national school at O'Brien's Bridge on the Limerick/Clare border, proved to be the most serious and difficult of all. The pros and cons of this case have been debated at length in this House. I was deeply involved in it. I make no apology to anybody for having been involved in it because, as a public representative, I felt it my duty to come to the assistance of the small local community in this village which is one of the smallest villages in the country.
The most significant outcome of the Montpelier case is the lesson which it should teach to the Minister and his Department. It is a lesson which I sincerely hope the Minister has learned. I trust such a situation will never arise again. The trouble at Montpelier was due to bad handling and very bad public relations on the part of the Department of Education. The Minister, of course, had to accept the report of his inspectors but the plain fact of the matter was that the inspectors who went down there originally and met the parents came away with a completely false picture of what the feeling of the parents was.
We read in the paper and it was stated here that the inspectors reported back to the Minister that all except six of the parents were in favour of closing the school. The reason for this was that only six parents spoke at the meeting. What the unfortunate inspectors failed to recognise was that those six parents who spoke at the meeting were speaking on behalf of all the parents. Montpelier was badly handled. It was a bad mistake. The school should not have been closed because of the fact that it was a marginal three-teacher school. There was every indication that it could and would become a viable three-teacher school.
I sincerely hope that in future great care will be taken by the Minister and his officials when the question of closing any school arises. With all due respect to the academic qualifications and so forth of the Minister's inspector's, they will have to realise that, even though a school which is about to be closed may be in an isolated rural area, the people are intelligent and are interested in the welfare of their children. They are entitled to express their views about where and in what manner their children should be educated. In the Montpelier case the parents did not give their consent to the closure. Subsequent events proved that they were violently opposed to it. Yet, in the light of that, the Minister went ahead and persisted in his decision.
The story of Montpelier has been written. It has been misrepresented and falsely presented by certain sensation-seeking journalists and others. I deplore in particular the television programme that was transmitted on this matter in the early days of the row. The screaming women and so forth were highlighted but no attempt was made to get down to a discussion on the basic issues involved. It seems to be the attitude that a rural community does not count any longer. Dr. Lucey said a decade ago that rural Ireland was stricken and dying. The attitude seems to be that a big stick can be held over small helpless rural communities. Fortunately—and this will be more marked in future—these small rural communities will fight for their rights. The Minister and his Department will have to be very careful and they will have to get goodwill and co-operation all round.
There is another aspect of education on which I have spoken on previous occasions. I cannot find any reference to it in the Minister's speech. I may be wrong, but I have read the Minister's speech and cannot find any specific reference to adult education, a topic which has been receiving increasing attention in recent times. There is a subvention for the Catholic Workers' College and other institutions. The need for adult education is now beginning to be recognised. Over the past week-end a conference on adult education was held in Limerick city. A new national organisation has now been established under the title of Aontas. I understand that Mr. Con Murphy, who was a pioneer in this field, has been carrying out a survey into the prospects for adult education. I do not know when a report of this survey will be available but there are one or two points which I should like to make.
Adult education has been developing in this country in a rather haphazard manner. No one is able to define clearly what is meant by the term "adult education". We must not lose sight of the fact that it is an integral part of the educational system in most civilised countries in the world. It is also noteworthy that particularly in Great Britain and the United States of America the universities have participated very significantly in the promotion of adult education. For example, in Great Britain, 21 universities operate extension courses mainly in co-operation with the workers' educational association which is an offshoot of the trade union movement. In the United States it is estimated that 76 universities are providing extension courses.
In this country in 1946 an important development took place involving the first important contribution by our universities in the field of adult education when the then illustrious president of University College, Cork, Dr. Alfred O'Rahilly, introduced a system of extension courses which operated in towns and rural areas throughout Munster. Since their introduction in 1946 hundreds of people have been able to pursue courses in economics and sociology and various other disciplines. I do not think the other universities have even attempted to follow the lead of Dr. Alfred O'Rahilly in University College, Cork. The whole approach to adult education in this country has been haphazard and has been looked on more or less as a pastime.
As one of the few Members of this House who, perhaps, has had experience of adult education I shall try to put the record straight in this regard. There are two countries in which adult education has greatly contributed to the growth of the economy. They are Denmark and Canada. In the case of Canada I refer in particular to Nova Scotia. The dramatic results achieved and the tremendous contribution made by the folk-schools in Denmark to the economic and social development of that nation are well-known. In Northern Canada, the University of Anti-gonish in the Province of Nova Scotia, sent out its staff into small rural villages and by educating the local people in community co-operation have been able to transform the economic life of the poorer parts of the province.
Quite apart from the work of Dr. Alfred O'Rahilly, I am aware of the very good work being carried out by the Catholic Workers' College and I should also like to pay tribute to the trade union movement for its contribution in this field. With the establishment of this new national organisation, Aontas, I hope the time is not far distant when there will be a comprehensive national policy for adult education. It is an important factor in any modern democracy and such a policy should be implemented here without further delay.
Another point which arises in connection with this matter is the question of youth clubs. We hear much about juvenile delinquency; people speak a lot about the problems of youth and so forth. Many organisations here are doing tremendous voluntary work for the youth of this country. That is true of Limerick city and I was horrified to find out some time ago that a youth club run by the Augustinian Fathers, catering for 300 or 400 young people has been informed that the Department of Education can no longer pay the very meagre stipend which to date they have been paying to the instructors in this youth club.
For the past few years this club had been availing of the services of physical training instructors and others in the employment of the vocational education committee. In respect of this valuable work the instructors received a very small fee from the Department of Education—I do not know the exact figure but it is something in the region of £100. The instructors involved in this project are professional men and have done tremendous work for the young people in the clubs. It is a disgraceful and deplorable state of affairs that the Department have now announced that they will no longer pay this meagre sum. It is all the more deplorable in view of the fact that the Minister has a Parliamentary Secretary one of whose responsibilities is to look after the youth of this country. The Augustinian Fathers will continue to run their club with the aid of a voluntary committee of lay people in Limerick. I might add that we are not all bigots in that city. The vast majority have a social conscience and many of our citizens are quietly and unobtrusively engaged in social work.
I hope the Minister realises the implications of this decision of the Department. The country must be completely in the red when it has to take such measures. I am not competent to speak on the finances of the country, particularly when Deputy FitzGerald is sitting beside me and Deputy O'Donovan is also here, but this whole affair appears to me quite appalling. Representations have been made to the Minister and the reply from the Department has been published in the local papers: "We regret to say we cannot continue to provide the funds...."
A matter I should also like to raise concerns career guidance and all that that implies. On many occasions I have deplored the lack of such facilities in our schools. I am glad to note from the Minister's speech that it is his intention to have a qualified career guidance teacher attached to all post-primary schools, and this I regard as most important. On many occasions I have seen boys and girls leaving post-primary institutions—many with good leaving certificates—and they have not the foggiest notion of what they wish to do afterwards. In many cases they drift into occupations for which they are temperamentally and otherwise totally unsuited. The fact that there will be a qualified person available in post-primary schools to guide these young people is very important.
