When the history of modern Ireland comes to be written, it may well be that the role of elite, private, fee-paying schools in its formation will merit a chapter of its own.
Amongst those in the present Cabinet who attended private schools are Leo Varadkar and Roderic O Gorman. For the record, both are past pupils of the King’s Hospital School where fees currently range from €8,485 per annum for day pupils to about €20,000 for boarders.
Private education is still widely seen by many as not just elitist but as a marker for social privilege. This is particularly so by the left in Ireland who routinely argue that private, fee-paying schools should not receive any state funding whatsoever. At present, the salaries of teachers in private schools are paid for by the state just as they are in public schools.
However, it could be argued that in a free society people should be allowed to spend their money on whatever they like and not be penalised by the state for doing so. It’s also true that if wealthy parents didn’t spend money on education, the state would have to do so anyway. Besides, a lot of teachers in the DEIS sector will tell you that, on its own, penalising private schools will not improve their lot.
However, where the issue of private schools should grate is in the sense of hypocrisy embodied by many of those who attend such schools. This is particularly so in Ireland’s political realm where we are routinely treated to the spectacle of those who have benefitted most from social privilege and trappings like a private education going on to build political careers based on, of all things, equality!
It appears that no country does irony quite like equality-obsessed liberal Ireland.
Yet, whatever about the irony of Ireland’s elite blue bloods building political careers on equality, it seems like no one can quite match Ireland’s silver spoon socialists when it comes to hypocrisy. Behind the carefully crafted images of Ireland’s leading leftist politicians standing in solidarity with Ireland’s downtrodden proletariat are some remarkable stories of social privilege. It’s hardly surprising, therefore, that many of these same people attended private, fee-paying schools.
One of the things that the carefully controlled Sinn Féin press machine will never be publicising about leader Mary Lou McDonald is the fact that she grew up in leafy south Dublin and attended the private, fee-paying Notre Dame Des Missions. It was much the same case for Eoin O Broin, Sinn Féin spokesman on housing and the Irish media’s go-to person for state-centred housing solutions in Ireland. He is a past pupil of fee-paying Blackrock College.
One of the things about privilege is that it extends beyond mere material wealth. This is epitomised by the existence of old boys networks and in more recent times, old girls networks, where connections are literally worth their weight in gold. This is true of the corporate world and is equally true of Ireland’s political and media ecosystem.
Ireland’s media and NGO sector is one largely sympathetic to those who hold liberal and leftist views. It’s a useful support network for anyone with a shared political world view hoping to build a political career in Ireland.
It’s well exemplified by the political career of Ivana Bacik, current leader of the Labour Party and past pupil of fee-paying Alexandra College on Dublin’s southside. Bacik first stood for election to the Seanad in 1997 without success. She stood for the European elections in 2004 and Dáil Eireann in 2009 and again in 2011 – all unsuccessfully. She eventually got elected to Dáil Éireann in a by-election in 2021.
Most people probably give up on a career in politics after the second or third rejection by the electorate but the point here is that Bacik’s background and political views enabled her to ride out these setbacks. There were always appointments to NGO committees and supportive media interviews to compensate for electoral rejection which kept her profile before the electorate. Perhaps, this is what is meant by privilege in a liberal, progressive Ireland.
In many respects, the further left you go in Irish politics the more privilege you encounter. Occupying the far-left in Irish politics, Solidarity-People Before Profit is a case in point.
On the private school league table, PBP appears to be at the top of the class with an impressive 40% of its parliamentary party having attended private, fee-paying schools. It’s an odd accolade for a party which likes to think of itself as the authentic voice of the Irish working class. For the record, Paul Murphy attended St. Killians where fees currently are €6,610 while Richard Boyd Barrett attended St. Michael’s College on Ailesbury Road where fees are a slightly more modest €6,153 per annum.
From the viewpoint of media coverage, it seems that PBP also occupy a position of special privilege. Those near daily appearances on national media by People Before Profit belie the fact that the party still only managed to get 2.6% of the votes in the last general election.
One of the ironies about socialism is that while it preaches about the merits of greater state involvement in the lives of citizens, many socialists themselves have no problem about relying on the private market for their own needs. In this way, self-proclaimed socialists will frequently choose private housing instead of public housing; private healthcare instead of public healthcare and private education instead of public education in their own lives.
For socialists and those on the left, it may well be a case of ‘do what I say not what I do’. In this, they may well have a lot more in common with the likes of Varadkar and O Gorman than they would like to admit.