Ahern adds fuel to row over Church and State

A ROW over the relationship between Church and State was fuelled yesterday by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s defence of the Catholic Church’s role in education.

Mr Ahern, responding to the Ferns Report, referred to the sense of “disappointment” at the extent of child abuse exposed by the inquiry, but put it into the context of a Church that made an indispensable contribution to Irish education.

His robust comments may have been prompted by what he perceived as a slight made against him by Progressive Democrat TD Liz O’Donnell on Wednesday.