If Charlie McCreevy had squeezed a Santa sack with £836 million down the education chimney, what could it do?

Instead of a computer for each primary school, it could buy one for each class, if not each pupil. It could provide lab facilities for budding second-level scientists. Lockers could be bought so that pupils' backs were not bent with their load of books.

Or, in January, when students are filling out their CAO forms, it could be used to increase the number of third-level places so that everyone who applies is sure of getting a place.

But perhaps the most glaring of the Republic's lingering disgraces might be tackled effectively. With all the talk of the wonderful education system, the National Adult Literacy Agency estimates that some 500,000 adults have severe difficulties in reading and writing.

January, college applications month for the educationally advantaged, has little to offer those who can't read the CAO form or write sufficiently well to fill it out. For them, the usefulness of Trinity College will be restricted to serving as a shortcut between College Green and Nassau Street.

Even while some of these adults are being helped to read and write, the education system is constantly replenishing the supply, churning out more illiterate adolescents. More than one in six school leavers cannot complete even the most basic literacy tasks.

The Minister for Education announced, in early January, that £57 million would be invested in an effort to tackle educational disadvantage. If this has been hailed as a "quantum leap" with regard to educational funding, what would £836 million be called? A cosmic somersault?