Nearly 5,000 exam centres will host some 118,000 exam candidates this morning, as the Leaving and Junior Certificate exams get underway.
Nearly 55,000 of them are taking the Leaving Certificate, including the Vocational Programme, while over 3,000 will do the Leaving Cert Applied.
More than 60,000 secondary students will sit the Junior Cert exams.
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Finance Minister Michael Noonan is expected to take leader's questions in the Dáil later after last night revealing he had undergone cancer treatment.
The 71-year-old old completed five weeks of radiotherapy for a sarcoma on his shoulder which has since been removed.
The Minister says his medical team is upbeat about his prognosis and there is little chance of a recurrence.
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The Government's been told to cut the amount of money health insurers are charged for public hospital beds.
That's the view of the Mater Private's CEO, who was commenting on news that over 50,000 people have been forced to drop their policies in the past year.
Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast earlier, Fergus Clancy says health insurance is no longer affordable because insurers are being forced to hike premiums to pay the HSE.
