College fees set to be ‘parked’ in deal

THE reintroduction of third-level fees will be “parked” for the foreseeable future under a revised Programme for Government concluded between Fianna Fáil and the Green Party.

The programme will be put to a vote at a special conference of Green members at the RDS in Dublin today. Under party rules, it will require the support of two-thirds of those voting in order for the Greens to continue in government.

The coalition partners finalised the revised programme last night, but refused to publish it as the Greens were anxious to prevent critiques of the document appearing in the media before today’s conference. The party entered the negotiations with a substantial “wish list”, but knew the poor state of the Exchequer finances would limit what they could achieve.