Government delaying college means test report ‘until after ploughing’
He believes the Government is deliberately waiting until after the National Ploughing Championships to roll out the report of an inter-departmental committee.
His fear is that the deliberations have already been completed, but that the decision has gone against the farming community.
“No Government minister or TD would have been able to walk through the ploughing if they had announced that farmland was to be considered as a capital asset,” Mr Comer said.
“The level of anger that’s building over this is considerable. If land is to be classed as a capital asset, it would be blatant dis-crimination against farmers.
“The Taoiseach would not have wanted to face up to 200,000 farmers if they had been told that their children were to be denied access to college due to unfair means tests, especially after the public sector pensions were excluded from these assessments.”
Addressing yesterday’s press conference at Heathpark, New Ross, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the Government was yet to receive the report.
He said: “That matter has not been brought before the Government by the ministers. However, we do know that the vast majority of the children of farming families do qualify for these grants. When the ministers bring the matter before the Government, we will consider the matter at that stage.”
Some 8.9% of all third-level students are from a farming background. The ICMSA says around 60% of farmers’ children presently qualify for grants.
Mr Comer added: “We would be happy to see 100% of farmers being disqualified on the basis of high incomes, because that would mean farmers were all making money. The reality is that in 2009, everyone recognised that farmers did not make any money at all.
“However, in the Celtic Tiger years, people could also see that land had real value, and people started to question the value of farmers’ assets. Land is not income. Land only has value if you are selling it, so it doesn’t make sense to bring it into these means tests.”
The ICMSA leader said that farmers’ accounts are assessed by the Revenue, just like any other citizen.
Mr Comer said that ICMSA categorically rejects the notion of a farm as a capital asset. He also cited media reports that bank deposits and second homes are set to join farms and be considered as assets to be included in the means test.
“If that is true, then simple justice dictates that the kind of gold-plated pensions only available to the public sector and politicians should be similarly classified as wealth,” said Mr Comer.
He said Education Minister Ruairi Quinn and those calling for a broad-based classification of wealth could not — with any consistency — argue that a guaranteed pension provision of half a final salary, together with a tax-free cash lump sum equal to a multiple of final salary, did not constitute wealth.
In those circumstances, farmers, other self-employed groups, and those working in the wider private sector, who are putting income aside for their old age, would be watching with great interest to see when Mr Quinn would acknowledge that the wealth that will provide so generously for their own old age is essentially the same as the wealth they propose to incorporate into a means test, Mr Comer claimed.
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