Madam, - Fine Gael, reverting to its Civil War roots, has decided that the teaching of Irish should no longer be "compulsory".
Yet party leader Enda Kenny has suffered compulsory English throughout his school years (13 years or so), and still offends against its grammar and syntax.
Perhaps it is time for us to admit that the teaching of English (and of mathematics, if many third-level science lecturers are to be believed) has also failed, and to declare that all currently "compulsory" subjects will in future be optional. - Yours, etc,
SEÁN O'SULLIVAN, Mawbeg, Enniskeane, Co Cork.