Court tells parents to pay €2,782 outstanding school fees

A DIVORCED couple have been ordered to pay nearly €3,000 in outstanding school fees in a case described by a judge as “desperately unfortunate”.

Sandford Park School in Ranelagh, Dublin, sued Ken and Emer Lee over the non-payment of €2,782 in fees outstanding for the second half of the 2009-2010 school year.

Mr Lee said he had discharged more than €340,000 in debts since the couple’s home in Stepaside had been sold, but he had refused to pay the outstanding fees to Sandford because of the manner in which his son Daragh, who had been going into his Leaving Certificate year, had been treated.

Reading from a prepared script at the Dublin District Court, Mr Lee said the decision to send his son home from school on August 26th last year, the first day of the academic year, was “deliberate, reckless, ruthless and without any regard for my son’s welfare”.

He said his son had been targeted as a warning to other parents who might not pay fees.

He said the school had not taken into account Daragh’s childhood battle with cancer, nor his parents’ divorce. He also said he had given his word the fees would be paid once the family home was sold, but this had been rejected by the school.

Both the bursar of the school, David Townsend, and the chairman of the board of governors, retired banker Brian McConnell, said they had made it “crystal clear” to the couple in a meeting in May last year and in a follow-up letter in June that outstanding fees needed to be paid before the start of the academic year 2010-2011.

Mr McConnell told the court that Sandford Park had a policy of not carrying over outstanding amounts, because parents would get into further debt. The school had shown the couple a “great deal of forbearance” as they had also missed payments in 2009, although they were later paid.

He told Judge Mary Collins they would have considered accepting an undertaking the fees would be paid once the family home was sold, but that was not was given.

That made the school doubt whether Mr Lee could afford the €6,800 school fees for the following year.

Mr Lee, who worked for RTÉ for 41 years before taking early retirement, accused Mr McConnell of lacking empathy for the financial pressure they had been under.

Judge Collins said the person most affected was Daragh. She recalled a conversation with a “respected and wealthy” businessman whose parents had to take him out of a fee-paying school when he was 15, but who did not let it defeat him. She hoped Daragh would be able to turn into a “fine young man” despite the adversity he faced at a young age.

She said the reluctance of the couple’s solicitors to give an undertaking in relation to the proceeds of the sale of the house meant the school could not be confident of getting its money. She ordered the couple to pay the outstanding fees, but made no order for costs.