In the Seanad on 7 February 2001, speaking on a Fine Gael private members' motion on inequality in 3rd level education, I said:

The motion refers to a scandal and this matter qualifies as a scandal for two reasons.

First, in terms of inequality at third level, there is no significant improvement. Despite all the attention that, allegedly, has been paid to this issue over the past 20 years, the figures show that access rates have improved only marginally. Third level education is still the preserve of those students who come from well-off families.

Second, it is a scandal because the importance of third level education is increasing all the time. In the past, a third level degree was something nice to have, no more than that. It has always been the guarantee of a better job and higher earnings throughout a career, but now it has become much more. Increasingly, it has become a necessary feather in one's cap in order to progress beyond the basic stage in almost any occupation.

The time has come to reassess our efforts in this area.

For too long we have been saying, "Of course, we're not doing enough but at least we are moving in the right direction and making progress".

I want to hear the Minister say - he did not say it tonight, although I was impressed with what he did say - that what we have been doing has not worked and we are not making worthwhile progress in that direction.

I listened to what Senator Ormonde and the Minister had to say about steps being taken and progress being made. The Minister is determined to do something about this problem, but if we are honest with ourselves we should realise that while access programmes are all very well, they are not making an impression on the programme.

Similarly, we should admit that free fees for university education have no relevance to the people who remain shut out of third level education. Free fees work to the benefit of the well off, not the disadvantaged.

We should not lay the blame for this situation solely on the current Government, as the motion states, because previous Governments have failed on this issue also.

We should be moving forward decisively on two fronts, the immediate and long term.

In the immediate future, the key to increased participation is a totally revamped grants system, and I agree that the motion before the House is correct in that respect.

The current grant is simply not enough. It is not enough just to remove the financial barrier that stands between many young people and their entry to third level education. The level of grants should not only properly reflect the living expenses of the student, but should also recognise that when a student is attending college it means an income is foregone to their family. Given the current state of job opportunities, that means that much more income is being foregone than in the past.

The current system of means testing for student grants needs to be revamped to remove the anomaly whereby farmers' children can qualify much more easily than others. That point has not been referred to in this debate. Solving that problem is easier said than done, however, but someone - I believe it has to be the Minister - must grasp that nettle if we are to have equality.

In the longer term, it remains as true as ever that the road to third level education begins on the first day at school, or even at pre-school age.

From the beginning the attitudes and accomplishments that will decide whether children set their heights on third level education are rapidly being set in stone at an early age.

For that reason, we cannot separate the participation problem at third level from the wider problem of disadvantage in education generally. One leads from the other as surely as night follows day.

When I became involved with the leaving certificate applied,  I was surprised to find that the national target for 2000 was for 90% of children to finish second level education. I was disappointed because that meant that one in ten would not finish school.

The year 2000 has come and gone, yet the real problem turned out to be worse because we did not even reach that target. Disappointingly, we only reached 80%, which means that two out of ten students do not have the opportunity of finishing second level education.

Show me a student and I can tell from what stream of our society he or she comes. It remains as true for students completing second level education as for those entering third level.

What must happen for this fundamental problem to attract the serious attention it deserves? We must set our sights on achieving greater participation in education for students from disadvantaged areas. The Minister's heart is in the right place, but let us see him determined to achieve that goal.