The Government will publish a national strategy to deal with widespread adult illiteracy later this month, the Minister of State in charge of adult education, Mr Willie O'Dea, has promised. The strategy will be part of a package of proposals contained in the Green Paper on adult education.
Mr O'Dea was speaking at the presentation of a survey which finds that embarrassment, shame and fear of stigma are the most frequently cited reasons why people with reading and writing difficulties do not participate in adult literacy schemes.
Only 1 per cent of people with reading and writing problems are currently using the literacy service, the director of the National Adult Literacy Agency, Ms Inez Bailey, said yesterday. A recent OECD study had estimated that around 500,000 people - 25 per cent of the adult population - experienced such problems.
She said the "action plan" recently announced by the Tanaiste, Ms Harney, to combat unemployment contained a "huge gap" in that it did not recognise the large number of people with literacy problems. "Without basic literacy skills, people like this will neither get a job nor be able to access mainstream FAS or CERT-style training programmes for the unemployed."
She was similarly critical of the Government, the employers and the unions for making no effort to introduce workplace literacy schemes, such as existed in most other European countries.
The survey on access to and participation in adult literacy quotes the OECD as saying: "The quiet contributions that literacy makes to the economy are not fully appreciated."
The report finds that a key deterrent to people taking literacy classes is their unpleasant memories of school: "Having been labelled negatively in school they have a deeply rooted fear of putting themselves once again in a potentially humiliating situation."
It urges a public education programme to raise awareness of the literacy issue. "Unless the public at large can be sensitive to those with reading and writing difficulties, the stigma and its negative consequences will remain."
It also urges greater awareness of the problem among officials who have to deal with the public, and who need to be sensitive to the "great embarrassment" caused to people with poor literacy skills by form-filling. It urges more officials to follow the example of their colleagues in the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs, FAS and Teasgasc and avail of NALA's literacy awareness training programme.
Given that embarrassment and fear are such deterrents, the report stresses the importance of "word of mouth" as the best way to recruit people to adult literacy schemes. This would have to involve "key players within each local community".
