Student grants dividing coalition

THE Fine Gael/Labour coalition Government could break up on any number of issues. They may not see eye to eye on the running of the economy, such as on spending cuts or taxation. They might fall out on the issue of abortion or on same-sex marriage. Or they might split on some completely different question that might take us all by surprise.

 

The latest bone of contention between the parties is on the issue of student grants paid to farmers and other self-employed people to help educate their sons and daughters.

The Labour Party wants the value of agricultural land to be included in the means test for the grants. However, a growing number of Fine Gael TDs are coming out in public to oppose this.
A decision is to be taken on the issue shortly. Education Minister Ruairi Quinn and the Labour Party strongly believe the present system is loaded in favour of farmers and against the PAYE sector. They claim well-off farmers are able to manipulate the means test to ensure they get the grant, whereas PAYE employees on much smaller incomes are unable to qualify.

It is not going to be easy to sort this one out. Labour Party members, supporters and possibly the great mass of PAYE workers are going to be very angry if Ruairi Quinn backs down in the face of Fine Gael opposition to his plan to include the value of farm land in the means test.

However, the major farm organisations are putting huge pressure on Fine Gael TDs to oppose the plan. So far, the campaign against change in the system seems to be working. Almost every day over the past week or so we have been hearing about some Fine Gael TD or other who has come out against Ruairi Quinn’s plan. The Labour Party and the trade unions, on the other hand, are remaining fairly quiet on the issue. The farmers, as usual, are winning the propaganda battle.
Nobody, whether they are farmers, self-employed or trade unionists, will quietly surrender a privilege they have enjoyed for years, whether the country can afford that privilege or not or whether they are entitled to it or not.

Everybody is entitled to a good education, just as everybody is entitled to good healthcare. Everybody agrees with that. But is it fair to pay a student grant to a farmer with 600 acres of good land in the Golden Vale? I don’t know how much money is paid in student grants to such farmers but if they can show that their income is below a certain level, they are entitled to be paid the grant under the present system. That grant is paid for by the taxpayer, who might be judged not to be eligible for it.

The system is supposed to help educate the sons and daughters of those who cannot afford to send their children to third-level colleges. If it does not do that, it has to be changed. If those grants are being paid to well-off farmers and others, that too must change.

However, I don’t know if including the value of an asset such as farm land in the means test will bring about a fairer system. Some have suggested that a farmer’s income should be assessed over a number of years, rather than on an annual basis. That would make it more difficult to manipulate the figures.

Politics is mainly about compromise. The farmers – and Fine Gael – cannot have it all their own way. Neither can the Labour Party. They are in a coalition government and a test of the Government is their ability or otherwise to reach agreement.

Of course, no matter what agreement is reached, a lot of city dwellers will continue to believe Irish farmers are spoiled. They think farmers would not be farmers if they were not subsidised by the taxpayer. They think farmers pay little or no tax. They think farmers are always complaining.
I lived, worked and drank among Dublin city people for most of my working life and, even though I am from the country, I learned to live with their gripes against rural people. They think most country people are opposed to Dubliners.

In a pub one night in Dublin’s north inner city, I got talking to a local man about a football match earlier that day in which Dublin were beaten by Meath. As is usual in those cases, he blamed the referee, who came from Offaly or Galway, I think, for Dublin’s defeat. “Why do we always get a culchie referee?” he asked me. As far as he and a lot of Dubliners are concerned, it is a question of Dublin versus the rest.

Do you think they have any sympathy for country people on the septic tank issue? They have no understanding of it. They and their parents and their grandparents seldom, if ever, had to worry about toilet waste. They just pull a chain or press a lever and, hey presto, the stuff is gone. That’s the way it always was. They don’t even know what a septic tank is.

A lot of them don’t realise the amount of work that has gone into producing the pint of milk, the loaf of bread, the pound of meat or the bag of spuds they bought in their local supermarket. They never stop to think that it might have been a farmer in County Clare or even County Dublin who produced those necessities of life. They never stop to think that the bad weather that ruined their holiday in Courtown or Brittas Bay may have also destroyed the livelihood of some poor farmer for that year.

When they see farmers protesting on the streets of their city, they wonder if those farmers have nothing better to do.

Hopefully, the student grants issue will be resolved in a fair manner for all. However, no matter what decision is reached, a lot of jackeens will continue to believe farmers are thriving off the fat of the land.