Shane Ross (Independent)

I wish to raise the need for the Minister to give a guarantee of the future of the music school in Waterford Institute of Technology. The Minister will probably be aware of the very intense campaign that has been going on in Waterford over several months to keep the music school there open under a certain amount of internal and external pressure to close it. There are two issues, the first being very broad, which is that of the humanities being subordinated to technical subjects. The other is the specific one of Waterford's music school.

I pay tribute to those who have campaigned to keep the school open over the period, who have successfully persuaded the powers that be that the schools should be kept open, at least for the moment. However, it is a pyrrhic victory if the Minister gives no guarantee of the future of the music school. Perhaps I might deal very broadly with the wider issue that the humanities are being subordinated to technical subjects. It is no secret that many of those involved in this campaign felt that that was the trend in the school itself and that they could look only to the Department to rescue them. Their internal resources indicated they were losing the battle. There is a cry from the heart from those involved in the humanities in WIT to the Minister to give them the security for their subject that they cannot win internally for themselves.

The Minister knows that the school opened on 6 September, although there had been fears that it would be closed because of under-funding. Unfortunately, the fees were raised by 20%. That will cause a great deal of difficulty, since many of those who had already registered had paid fees and are now being asked for an extra 20%. However, that 20% is on top of a 35% increase the year before. We are now seeking a substantial amount of funding from students at the school, something of which they were not given proper notice; it appears to be retrospective. Some of them will obviously not pay that amount. The minimum that could be done here is to ring-fence departmental money for WIT or whomever so that it is given specifically to the music school in Waterford and cannot be pushed or diverted to any other place or any other form of education.

The accusation is often made that this is somehow an elitist form of education and that it does not pay its way because one cannot measure the results in the humanities in pounds, shillings and pence. However, that does not stand up. In this case, the fees have been set higher than those of more prestigious bodies such as the Royal Irish Academy of Music. This is a direct result of the Department, despite paying 11 teachers, not giving them the guarantees they need and allowing the uncertainty to remain, which is shared by many people in different areas of the school, including arts.

In August the college sent out letters asking for 40 staff redundancies, which naturally undermined staff. The Department appears to have kept its head down in this controversy, adding to the uncertainty. We need a recognition by the Minister that music is an important part of education in the Waterford IT, that it will be kept going come hell or high water, that it has a place there and that even though the numbers have fallen slightly, a guarantee of a future for this humanities subject in the institute will be given by the Minister.