Batt O'Keeffe, the minister for education, approaches the world with a fixed ideology and some dodgy statistics – a lethal combination when the futures of so many people depend on his decisions. His relatively short time in his department has been marked by an unshakeable belief that the return of third-level university fees is both desirable and inevitable. That determination has been matched by an apparent certainty as to how much the government will save when the inevitable happens.

His arguments have a surface appeal. "At a time of difficult choices for the public purse", he said in January, "there is a strong equity argument that those who benefit from higher education – and who can afford to contribute to the costs of their higher education – should be asked to do so." He went on to suggest that there was "little conclusive evidence that the abolition of fees in the mid-1990s had widened participation among poorer sections of society".

He is right about that second point, although it would be equally true to suggest that there is no conclusive evidence that the abolition of fees has had no effect on widened participation. Very little research has been done into the area. One survey in the late 1990s suggested that increased participation in Dublin's north inner city had resulted from the abolition of fees. Another, more recent, study showed university participation still to be a middle-class privilege.

In any case, the whole context in which we are having the debate about third-level fees has changed, even since O'Keeffe made those remarks two months ago. The number of unemployed has grown at a terrifying pace, with no sign of stopping, or even slowing down. The Taoiseach last week prepared us for a figure of 400,000 unemployed; today, in this newspaper, four leading economists predict with confidence that the figure will actually reach 500,000 by Christmas. These are frightening, bewildering and unprecedented figures which change utterly the nature of Irish life and society.

Ireland's economy has been sabotaged by Fianna Fáil which, for the moment, remains in control of the country's destiny. By the end of the year, 500,000 people and their families will have paid the price of that sabotage. Many of these are the people Batt O'Keeffe was referring to when he talked in January about those who could afford to pay for third-level education. They are people who this time last year were in full-time, well-paid employment, enjoying the fruits of the boom and with every expectation of sending their children onto third-level education. Perhaps they could have afforded to do so then. They can't afford it now.

There is an argument that we should continue with free fees at least until the worst of the economic depression is over in order to get as many of young people as possible into college, protect them from the worst of what is to come in future years, and have a well-educated population ready to take advantage of the upturn. (I'm aware that this may seem like a wishy washy liberal argument, a product of what George Orwell called the "pansy left", but no matter; governments are there, amongst other reasons, to protect their citizens.)

A stronger, more immediate case for sticking with the current system until times improve is that many of the people O'Keeffe once saw as a cash cow to be milked for fees are no longer in a position to pay for their childrens' third-level education. They cannot help him. They need his help. There is, in fact, relatively little money to be generated for the state by university fees in the current circumstances, and their reintroduction would create enormous hardship and worry for very little gain.

Almost overnight, the issue of third-level fees has broadened from one about helping working-class people into college to one about aiding the middle class (or the middle class turned unemployed class, if you like) to do the same thing. Over the coming weeks, those of us still in jobs will be taxed, extravagantly if quite properly, in order to put some order on the public finances, and in deciding these new rates, the government has carte blanche to raise what it wants.

Not all of this money should be devoted to balancing the books; some of it surely needs to be diverted to preparing for life beyond the recession. Allowing the current regime of third-level funding to continue would secure the education of many teenagers whose options would be severely limited by a return of fees in an era of mass unemployment.

ddoyle@tribune.ie