A discrimination case, which concerns the future of 40 Irish lecturers working in Italian universities, is currently being contested in the European Court of Justice. It is expected that the Government will highlight the problems of the lecturers through the European Commission. The teachers are not staffed as permanent members, they get temporary leave, and the situation has been going on for over a decade, according to Dr Henry Rodgers, Irish spokesman for the Association of Foreign Lecturers in Italy, which number about 1,500. He is hopeful that Tom Kitt TD, Minister of State for Labour Affairs, who has been asked to intervene on behalf of the Irish lecturers, will help effect change. Rodgers had "a very positive meeting" with the minister in Leinster House earlier this month when he was home on holidays from his lecturing job in Rome.

Rodgers, who lectures at La Sapienza, a university in Rome, says: "I am in regular contact with Irish politicians both home and Europe-based. Their immense contribution to our campaign is doing honour to the image of our country in the eyes of my foreign colleagues".