Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael)

——telling our national broadcaster how to respond to issues of the day and making such critical comments. Is there any other western democracy where the chairman of a communications committee would write this type of letter to a national newspaper? Will the Deputy Leader respond to my points on this issue? Does he support the view of the writer with regard to the coverage on RTE being unfair? It is a disturbing letter to be sent from the Chairman of the committee to The Irish Times undermining RTE's reporting on the tribunal. I look forward to hearing what the Deputy Leader has to state on it.

I also wish to raise the matter of the underfunding of primary education and a letter many of us received. Senators O'Toole, Healy-Eames and Alex White raised this matter last week. We have now received a letter signed by the National Association of Boards of Management in Special Education Schools, the Church of Ireland Board of Education, Gaelscoileanna, Educate Together, the Islamic Board of Education and the Catholic Primary Schools Managers Association. They are extremely concerned about the lack of realistic capitation and ancillary grants which means almost all schools will be sustained only by their community fundraising efforts.

It is time we had the Minister for Education and Science here to discuss this specific matter in view of the letter signed by so many people and sectors in education who are extremely concerned about funding. Parents up and down the country know about this because they do so much fundraising themselves. It is time for a realistic examination of primary school education.