In July this year, a Co Meath parish priest unleashed a storm of protest when he suggested reducing the contribution made to four primary schools from the parish fund. His reasoning was that fewer people were practising their faith and contributing to parish funds, and thus these people were being unfairly burdened.

The Department of Education and Science gives primary schools a capitation grant of £60 per pupil, on condition that the board of management collects £8.50 per pupil (or a reduced amount for disadvantaged schools) from the local community, which usually translates into the local Catholic parish.

Father Andrew Farrell said towns across Ireland were no longer to be seen as parishes. They are the population centres that contain parishes of the faithful within them. He said the local contribution had been "a sensible arrangement when the parish and the community were one, but it now obsolete".

Fine Gael's education spokesman, Richard Bruton, responded by saying "it is time that the State shouldered its constitutional obligation for the full cost of primary education. Under the Constitution, the State is obliged to provide for free primary education and shall endeavour to supplement and give reasonable aid to private and corporate educational initiatives. "Yet for years the Irish model has been to have the church act as a `private patron', thereby relieving the State of providing the full cost of free education."

A spokesman for the Department of Education says it's a matter for the Board of Management to lodge the local contribution. The sum required shall be provided by the parish community or other appropriate analogous community or body.