Education in Ireland can best be put in perspective by reference to two key documents. The first, Investment in Education, is the cornerstone on which future development of the Irish educational system will be based. Unlike the equivalent reports that temporarily shock the British public, and are then shelved for ever more, for Ireland, Investment in Education is more than a pious and obvious reiteration of education's value to a developing economy. To English eyes it is also a shocking indictment of the corporate neglect that education has received from both the politicians and the Church during the fifty years of independence. A neglect that no amount of partisan or clerical special pleading should be allowed to cover up.