Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House and I welcome the discussion on this important report. The Minister will appreciate the urgency of many of its recommendations, which need Government attention and need the Minister in particular to respond positively.

I welcome many of the indications given by the Minister today, in particular the fact that the re-introduction of fees is off the agenda. Members will recall that around this time last year we were discussing this issue as it was a recommendation of the Minister's predecessor. I am delighted it is now off the agenda.

I am also glad that the Minister involved herself in consultative talks last week with all partners in education at third level. That is an important and welcome development. She will be aware, from her meetings with those groups, that high, if not uppermost, on their agendas is the inadequacy of the funding available at third level. Many of those present at the meetings would have indicated that there is a near crisis in funding in many universities and institutes which is strangling them in terms of their hopes to advance and develop. I hope this report might represent the first step in, once and for all, putting in place a strategy and plan for the funding of third level education.

The OECD review of higher education in Ireland resulted in its publication last September of an important and detailed report. It was a comprehensive study of where Ireland lies in relation to other OECD countries. This document reaffirms the critical importance of education in all respects. The OECD report is clear that the importance of tertiary education to Ireland's economic and social development, which cannot be disputed, should not obscure its role in the intellectual and artistic life of the nation or the contribution it makes to citizenship and civil society.

The September OECD report clearly shows that educational attainment has expanded greatly in recent decades. For example, 77% of those between the ages of 25 and 34 have completed at least upper secondary education. This is a welcome development as it is above the OECD average. The figure, however, for those between the ages of 55 and 64 is only 37%, far below the average. This displays that Ireland has come a long way towards a position of relative strength from one of relevant weakness. Lifelong learning, widening participation and the encouragement of mature students to enter tertiary education have not been given much emphasis and must be reinforced in the future if Ireland is to capitalise on its success during the past decade.

It is clear that Ireland's economic strength and success are linked to investment in education not only at higher level, but at all stages. Some of the findings in the OECD's report should ring alarm bells in this regard. Ireland's investment in the education system, as a whole, is lower than the OECD average. In terms of public expenditure, it ranks 25th out of 30 OECD countries. Between 1995 and 2000, public expenditure declined from 4.7% to 4.1%. Furthermore, expenditure per student in tertiary education in Ireland is also below the OECD average. In that regard, we rank 14th out of 26 countries. The CHIU claims that direct State support per student in the university sector fell by €1,240 between 1995 and 2000.

Of considerable concern also is the question of expenditure in the area of research and development. As a proportion of GDP, Ireland's research and development budget is well below the EU and OECD averages. From a lifelong learning perspective, the OECD found that the proportion of mature students entering higher education is extremely low. On the question of educational disadvantage, it noted that great disparities exist in terms of the participation of students from families of different socio-economic backgrounds at third level. In 1997, the proportion of new entrants aged 26 and over to university level education was only 2.3%. This compares to a figure of 19.3% in other OECD countries.

Despite the great expansion in student numbers, to which the Minister referred, and the introduction of student grant schemes in 1968 great disparities continued to exist in the participation of students from families of different socio-economic status. This did not change significantly after the abolition of tuition fees for undergraduate studies in 1995-96.

The OECD's findings in respect of inadequate funding did not come as a major surprise to even casual observers of the Irish education system. The Conference of Heads of Irish Universities has frequently referred to the often precarious financial position in which those institutions find themselves and likened the decision of the Government to freeze increases in university funding in 2004 to an equivalent cut in funding of €800 per student.

The president of UCD, Dr. Hugh Brady, recently outlined that, for the first time in its history, the university is in the red. He indicated the serious consequences this will have for development and stated that UCD is €3.5 million in debt at present. This figure will continue to rise during the year. That is a clear example of an institution on the border of crisis. Nothing the Minister said earlier indicates that she will support universities and other educational institutions throughout the country that are in major financial difficulties. During last year, Trinity College made soundings similar to those of Dr. Brady.

It should be remembered that education at all levels requires enhanced support. We need to tackle problems such as early school leaving and absenteeism in order to retain the highest possible number of young people in education. The Government has made a commitment that by the end of this decade 90% of all people will complete the leaving certificate examination. Encouraging high achievement rates at second level will have a corresponding effect on third level participation rates and success. To date, however, the Government has made painfully slow progress in respect of this commitment. Each year, at least 18% of secondary school pupils leave school before completing the leaving certificate. It is an indictment of successive Governments that this high level continues to obtain. In addition, it is of serious concern that more than 1,000 children fail to make the transition from primary to secondary school each year. Participation at third level is hugely dependent on people's earlier experience of education. When children are lost to education at the ages of 11 or 12, it is a mammoth task to encourage them to re-enter the system.

There is considerable merit in the OECD's recommendation that a tertiary education authority be established. As envisaged, this would be a single funding authority for the universities and institutes of technology which at present come under separate funding arrangements. The current system is outdated and may stifle the further development of the institute of technology sector. I am anxious to hear the Government's plans, other than those outlined earlier by the Minister, in terms of progressing this recommendation. Governments all over Europe are devolving responsibilities and freedoms to educational institutions. This is balanced by tough accountability mechanisms which encourage them to act more innovatively and to be more adaptable and responsive to local opportunities.

On the question of the return of third level fees, many people who saw this as a threat will welcome the fact that the Minister has clearly outlined the position. Fine Gael, as the main party in the Government that abolished the fees in 1990, will not agree to their return in any form. The former Minister for Education and Science favoured their return, but such a response to the funding difficulties of the universities and the institutes of technology would only compound educational disadvantage. Furthermore, I believe that if the Government reintroduces third level fees in any form, this could then be used as a reason to cut its contribution to the higher level education sector. The net result would be to charge students tuition fees while leaving universities and institutes of technology in the same financial situation. It is absolutely unacceptable.

The OECD has already recognised this possibility and has made a key recommendation on page 28 of its report which states:

In order to incentivise HEIs to actively seek external sources of funding, the Government should make a clear statement that income they generate from the sources outside those provided by the State, will not be the subject of offsetting against State funding.

The Minister may have failed to do that but perhaps she will comment on this later. The Government should now make such a statement as higher educational institutions require greater stability in funding.

It has been noted many times that considerable damage is done to the work of these institutions when their funding situation is chopped and changed or is unreliable and piecemeal, as has happened in the past. There is something of a contradiction in the report as regards the fees questions. While on the one hand it does not insist that students should not share the cost of their tuition, on the other hand it recognises the difficulties that may be caused by these fees. On page 30 of its report, the OECD review group states:

Another important area is part-time education, which is normally seen in many countries as the established route through tertiary education for students, often mature students from disadvantaged backgrounds. In Ireland the attractiveness of such a route is dissipated by the fact that unlike full-time students, part-time students are not eligible for maintenance grants and have to pay their fees.

That is one particular aspect that must be addressed by the Minister in the near future if we are to recognise the contribution that many people at work could make, by furthering their education along the steps of the ladder she referred to earlier, if they were given equal status with full-time students. I am aware of a foundation course in an institute of technology that failed solely because the students were forced to pay fees. Little recognition is given in the report to the fees students have to pay in another way, namely, registration fees. Nobody would have believed that these would have gone from the nominal fee as originally intended up to the current levels of €700 plus.

It is crucial that the question be asked whether the reintroduction of fees for full-time students might have the same negative effect upon education participation. There are recommendations that the educational institutions need to take on board as well as regards third level structures including outside experience in the college management equation. In addition, the report states clearly that Government bureaucracy should not frustrate enhanced co-operation and interaction between universities and institutes of technology. The OECD report refers to an attempt by University College Cork and the Cork Institute of Technology to develop a joint marine and nautical research and teaching centre. It finds that this initiative was frustrated by the inability to arrange complementary funding from national sources, within the work timeframe.

We know Ireland lacks a national strategy agenda for change in the third level sector. More than anything else priority in education demands that the Minister put together a third level plan for funding in particular. This would allow the third level institutions to progress with confidence, enhancing the solid foundation they have already established for themselves through their wonderful initiatives to give the Irish workforce an added advantage when we are competing for outside investment. If there is a doubt in anyone's mind that there is not wholehearted support from the State as regards funding for the management of third level institutions, that could precipitate a rot which will be difficult to redress.