Education sparks debate in Leinster House

Issued on June 29, 2012 at 11:38 AM

The Irish Coalition for the Global Campaign for Education recently had the opportunity meet with Minister Joe Costello about the role of education in development. On foot of their submission to the White Paper Review on Irish Aid, they wanted to express their concern to the Minister about the current situation of education in development, the cut in budgets over the years, the percentage of aid spent on education [10 - 12%] and the fear that education would lose out to other priorities.

Whilst it is accepted by all that Irish Aid has a remarkable record on aid internationally and their country programmes are delivered to a very high standard, the Coalition wanted to reiterate and highlight the importance of education in achieving improvements in maternal health, HIV/Aids, poverty and providing workers with opportunities for Decent Work. There is no doubt that both the Minister and Irish Aid agree on the importance of education and its long-term effects in improving the lives and prospects of citizens in developing countries, but the Coalition feels that education needs to be given a higher priority within the new White Paper, have a strong political commitment behind it and Irish Aid policy to explicitly encourage and provide guidance to Governments of developing countries to make education a priority within their own National development plans.

The Coalition also met Maureen O'Sullivan [IND] TD and Dan Neville [FG] TD both of whom expressed their personal and professional interest and commitment to education and clearly understood the importance of it in a national and global context.

Dan Neville TD, subsequently raised the issue of education in development in the Dail with the Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Joe Costello, the transcript of which can be read here.