Ireland bottom of schoolbooks league

IRELAND is among a small number of EU countries where the Government does not contribute some or all the costs of children’s schoolbooks.

In Britain, Northern Ireland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and parts of Germany and Spain, the state pays for textbooks from primary through to second-level.

But despite bills of more than €350 for some students in second-level, particularly those starting first-year and fifth-year, Ireland is one of just two countries – the other is Portugal – out of more than a dozen analysed by RTÉ News where parents bear the full cost.