Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)

Is it not a fact that the Department of Education and Skills and the Higher Education Authority has known about this issue going back to 1997? Is it not a fact that the Comptroller and Auditor General's special report into this matter makes that exceptionally clear? Is it not a fact also that successive Ministers for Education have refused to deal with this issue? When there is a troika of presidents in a university like Limerick drawing the presidential salary for two years at the same time, the Higher Education Authority estimates that over €4 million in taxpayers' money is being paid to top people in universities while at the bottom of the university ladder young junior lecturers cannot get in and get the hours and, most important, regarding the approximate 150,000 people in third level education, when thousands of them and their families are seeking to find €1,500 to pay the fees at the point of entry into college, will the Minister not agree that the Government should be ashamed of itself?

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