This year's Leaving Cert should be cancelled as a result of Covid-19, with all students allowed to access their first or second-choice college courses, a Solidarity–People Before Profit TD has insisted.
Mick Barry said today that running the exams – a rite of passage for thousands of young people across the country every year – risks "the potential for an unacceptable level of mental health pressures on a large number of leaving cert students."
The Cork North-Central TD called on the Government to inject a "major investment" into third-level education so all students can access either their first or second-choice college courses.
Mr Barry said: "This year’s Leaving Cert students will be the first cohort of students in the history of the State to face major disruption of their classroom studies in both years of their final exam cycle.
"Failure to cancel the exams relatively soon will risk the potential for an unacceptable level of mental health pressures on a large number of leaving cert students.
"I think the exams should be cancelled, and I think there should now be a major investment in third-level education to create a large number of extra college places, allowing students to access either their first or second-choice options."
His comments come ahead of a Cabinet decision today on the closure of schools across the country amid mushrooming case numbers this week.
Yesterday, the Taoiseach hinted that schools are likely to be closed until at least the end of January.
Micheal Martin said that opening schools – which will see "a million people on the go" on the way in and out of classrooms – represents a big problem when it comes to curbing the spread of the virus.
"It's about the mobilisation of a million people in the context of a very high transmission of the virus in the community," he told RTE's News at One.
