Young FF vote to ban private secondary schools

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Written by Emma Power

Wednesday, 21 February 2007

A motion to ban private secondary schools was passed at the Ógra Fianna Fáil National Youth Conference held in the Ardilaun House Hotel over the weekend

An overwhelming majority of voters at the conference welcomed the motion which will be passed on to the senior Fianna Fáil party once policies have been drawn up by the National Youth Committee.

Chairman of the largest Ógra Fianna Fáil branch in the country, Cumann Kevin Barry UCD, James Carroll said: “After our own internal meeting, we decided to bring this motion forward and there was a very good debate at the conference. There was the whole issue of class distinction in the medium to long term. As a law student in UCD, I have noticed a subtle undercurrent of people being judged depending on the school they attended, which is grossly unfair. A school does not change the ability of a person,” he said.

The fact that people are paying up to €4,000 a year to send pupils to a private school that is receiving the same amount of government funding as a public school was also discussed. Once the policy has been drawn up, Mr Carroll is hopeful that the senior Fianna Fáil party will give it some thought.
“I think it is an important matter and, judging the reaction at our conference, it’s something that people feel very strongly about,” he added.

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