A farm family with €300,000 in their bank account still managed to get a grant to send their child to college, according to revelations in a new book.

Ruairi Quinn's former advisor has told how major flaws in the system meant families with substantial cash assets were still getting state aid. However, he says that attempts by Mr Quinn to change the grant system were shot down by Taoiseach Enda Kenny's officials during a "heated" debate.

The book, 'An Education', by John Walshe, who was Special Adviser to the former Education Minister, says that a government decision taken in 2011 to introduce a capital assets test was never implemented because it was blocked by Fine Gael, who were afraid of the powerful farming lobby.

At present, 44pc of students get some state assistance towards their college education. Grants are awarded on the basis of income only, without assets being taken into account.

Although the rules have been tightened up somewhat in recent years it is believed that some well-off farmers and professionals are still able to beat the system by reducing their 'reckonable income' at the right time.

Mr Walshe, who previously worked as Education Editor with the Irish Independent, says that Mr Quinn's officials were determined to introduce asset tests but Fine Gael refused point blank at a meeting on February 14 last year.

"We were suggesting a cut-off point on assets above which everything else would be considered. Our opening position was assets above a certain figure but we were ready to negotiate that upwards. We never got a chance.

"Inside the Taoiseach's dining room were his top advisers, Andrew McDowell, Mark Kennelly and Angela Flanagan, who were joined by Aine Kilroy from Agriculture and Damien Garvey, adviser to Arts Minister Jimmy Deenihan. Opposite them at the big table were Neil Ward (a Quinn advisor) and I, supported by Eamon Gilmore's advisers Jean O'Mahony and, briefly, Colm O'Reardon.

"I fumbled the ball when asked by McDowell for openers why the proposal was being brought to the Cabinet at all and not in the context of a wider sustainability report on funding higher education.

"I had always assumed that any minister can bring any memo to the Cabinet that he or she wants, even if it is going to be shot down in flames. I learned that day that it is the Taoiseach's prerogative to refuse to take it," he says.

"It went on from there, going from bad to worse. The Fine Gael team devoured us.

"The meeting went on for two very heated hours but, ultimately, we reached an impasse. Fine Gael would not accept any version of the capital assets test that included farming assets or, for that matter, business assets. Labour couldn't accept any version that didn't."

He adds: "We left chastened by what became known among the ministerial advisors as the St Valentine's Day Massacre."

Walshe's conclusion is that no capital assets test that includes farming assets will see the light of day under this Government.

Irish Independent