Joanna Tuffy (Labour)

I intend to speak on some general points as regards funding which I have raised before with the Minister. She has attended many debates in this House, in contrast to her predecessor as Minister for Education and Science. I looked at the monitor one evening and noticed she was attending Adjournment matters in the House. She is one of the few Ministers to have attended the House on such matters, which indicates the degree of interest she has in education. I welcome her here again.

Funding for universities and colleges of technology should encourage these institutions to offer courses in a more flexible way. A related point is that the difference between full-time and part-time participation should be blurred. I have made that point before and it is important that the Minister starts to direct third level education in the direction of the model, as I have outlined it, as this will help in efforts to increase access to third level education from different sectors of society.

Access to third level should not merely be determined by the leaving certificate and the points system, rather there should be a system based essentially on the lifelong learning model. This would encourage people to get third level qualifications according to their needs. It would allow a person to go, for example, from certificate level to a diploma, to a PhD, if necessary, as sometimes happens. They should be able to go from part-time to full-time education and back, from the institute of technology sector to university and back again. Our education system needs to be modelled more along these lines if it is to meet the requirements of modern society Some people cannot afford to enter full-time education on finishing school or they may not have the expectations of third level at that point. They may need a second or third chance to return to education to get a third level qualification.

This type of approach is also very important for the economy because it ensures that people upskill, particularly those working in vulnerable manufacturing areas, for example, whose job opportunities might be lessened by industrial developments. There is also a need to get more mature people involved in the education system, which is very much the concept for Irish education advocated in various reports including that of the OECD.

Incentives are needed to encourage the take-up of engineering and computerised technology places. The Government and the colleges have ignored and tended to cover up the lack of demand last September as regards the significant number of vacant places for engineering courses across the board. Many universities were advertising class vacancies, for the first time, when the CAO places were being offered.

A related issue is the need to implement the recommendations of the task force on lifelong learning. There have also been calls by Aontas and the Labour Party that the free fees initiative should be extended to part-time students. This has been costed by Aontas, which puts the required figure at approximately €40 a year. It could be more, but some of the costs could be absorbed by introducing a more flexible model where there is less of a distinction between part-time and full-time education and colleges are funded on a credit basis. This would take into account a larger student body, reflecting changes in the country's demographic profile.

The Government must support colleges towards engaging with the existing workforce and it must urgently address the skills deficit of that workforce. It must also address the recommendations of the NESF report, published last Monday. I represent the Clondalkin area which still has unemployment blackspots relative to other parts of the country. Institutes of technology should be entitled to funding to carry out special training projects for school-leavers and the unemployed in such areas. Take, for example, the IC manufacturing plant in Grange Castle. People in Clondalkin need to be upskilled so that they can apply for jobs there as well.

I welcome the announcement that the number of student places in undergraduate medical education is to be increased. The route into medicine by way of a primary degree and non-medical subjects is a good idea. At the same time significant recognition must be given to science and technology courses. The new entry mechanism can provide a greater opportunity to make the doctor profile more representative of the population in general. More doctors are needed from places such as Clondalkin, Tallaght and so on. The key to this is to provide transfers into these postgraduate courses from institutes of technology. Various reports, including the Clancy report on access to higher education, have found that lower socio-economic groups are much more widely represented in the institutes of technology than the universities.

The Minister said she would invite proposals on the graduate entry scheme from colleges. It is vital that the guidelines and criteria for such proposals should not discriminate against students in institutes of technology. The fact that graduates in all disciplines will be eligible for the graduate entry scheme will automatically favour universities over institutes of technologies, which tend to have a narrower spread of courses concentrated mainly in science, engineering and business. If we want different types of groups in our society to have access to medicine courses, we need to take that into account.

I welcome the Minister's encouragement for collaboration among colleges to allow institutes of technology to be linked with individual medical schools and colleges. For example, the Institute of Technology Tallaght could be linked with Trinity College Dublin in view of TCD's connection with Tallaght Hospital.

I share the concerns that Senators Fitzgerald and Henry expressed about the aptitude tests. Without going into the issues that have already been raised, we need to consider whether a system that is calculated on the number of leaving certificate points is not more transparent than one based on a leaving certificate together with an aptitude test. If an aptitude test is to be introduced for medicine courses just because they require students to have high points, why should such tests not be introduced for other courses that require high points or even medium or low points? For example, why should aptitude tests not apply to candidates for engineering or science courses? The introduction of aptitude tests alongside points would simply complicate the system. Why will aptitude tests apply only to one career when so many courses require high points?

At some point down the line we should instead consider broadening the number of postgraduate places, as happens in many others professions for which access to courses is restricted only by the standards set. As the Law Society is not allowed to restrict places on law courses, many people study law but the market determines whether they get jobs as solicitors. We should allow for the fact that some people will study medicine and then enter other careers. As long as that did not constitute a huge trend, that would probably be a good thing. Just as people who study law may then go into business instead, people who study medicine might go into research or management or something else altogether. That happens in other subjects and it is not necessarily a bad thing. Many other countries produce too many doctors, but it is better to produce too many than too few. Obviously, checks and balances would still be required, but our approach should be to open up the system. If we were to do that, we would get rid of the pressure on the points system and make medicine a much more accessible career to many people from different sectors of society who have an aptitude for it.