177 Mr. A. Reynolds asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will make representations to the Italian Government to discontinue discrimination against foreign lecturers, including Irish lecturers at Italian universities, and to dispute the introduction law 236 of 21 June 1995 in view of the serious problems to be rectified in this regard. [21254/98]

As the Deputy is no doubt aware, foreign lecturers, including several Irish lecturers, employed at a number of Italian universities have for a considerable time encountered difficulties in relation to their contracts and conditions of employment.

In December 1997, the European Commission decided to bring a case against Italy before the European Court of Justice regarding the acquired rights of foreign language lecturers in Italian universities. The Commission argued that in spite of a modification to Italian law in 1995 in response to previous rulings of the European Court of Justice about the contractual status of foreign language lecturers, a number of lecturers employed before 1995 were encountering significant difficulties in preserving their acquired rights. The Italian authorities informed the Commission on 11 August 1998 that the Italian Minister for Universities, Scientific Research and Technology had written to the rectors of Italian universities and directors of higher education, instructing the institutions concerned to respect the relevant acquired rights of foreign language lecturers.