I wish to avail of this occasion to apologise to the Ceann Comhairle for the remarks made by me during the heat of the moment on the discussion of the order of business today. Having been on the floor of the House yourself for a long time until very recently, you will appreciate how situations like this arise.
Adjournment Debate: County Limerick School.
The Chair appreciates the sentiments expressed by the Deputy and the circumstances in which the remarks were made.
Question No. 36 on the Order Paper of Thursday last was as follows:
To ask the Minister for Education when the decision to close Saint Joseph's CBS Secondary School, Adare, County Limerick, was conveyed to (a) the school management and (b) the parent's committee.
The answer given by the Minister to that question was as follows:
I have been in further correspondence with the manager of the school and I am not, therefore, in a position now to give any positive indication regarding the future of this school.
You will note, a Cheann Comhairle, that in my question I asked two specific questions. I asked for dates —the dates on which the decision of the Minister for Education with regard to the official closing of the school in question was conveyed to the management of the school and to the parents' committee. This was on Thursday. On Tuesday morning there was a little article in some of the papers, certainly in The Irish Press and The Cork Examiner, which was as follows:
The controversial Adare post-primary CBS, which was due to close at the end of the school year, has been given a reprieve for the third time following agitation by the parents' committee.
This was within a few days of the Minister telling us here in the House that he was not in a position to give any indication with regard to the future of the school.
The article went on to say:
Over two weeks ago the Minister for Education, Mr. Burke, informed the committee that the school would be closed down because it was not viable and it did not provide the comprehensive range of subjects. The decision angered the parents of the 90 pupils involved and a campaign of action was launched in a last ditch effort to save the school.
Last night the chairman of the parents' committee, Mr. Bill Chawke, was informed by a letter from the Minister that he had decided to restore recognition to the school and keep it open.
For the benefit of those who may be interested to know, may I say that Mr. Chawke is also the local Fine Gael bigwig? I continue the quotation:
Mr. Chawke said that the latest decision was the result of representations made by the West Limerick TD, Mr. Denis Jones, to the Minister, in which he pointed out that Adare was the centre of a rapidly developing area. Some 300 houses were due to be constructed in the near future which would ensure more pupils for the school.
The decision to keep the school open had dispelled the uncertainty regarding the future in this area of the Christian Brothers who had been in Adare for 120 years.
We had the situation that on Thursday, 5th July, the Minister could not tell me the dates on which he notified the school management and the parents' committee that the school was closed down. He was certainly very, very vague with regard to the future of the school. He could not give me any information on it at all and yet on Tuesday's papers—10th July—we had the article I have just read.
On Monday evening there was a radio programme after the 6.30 news which included a long interview with the chairman of the parents' committee. Naturally, he said more or less what appeared in the newspaper article I have quoted. When it came to giving out the praises, he was very liberal.
That is bad enough. One would expect that the Minister for Education, who normally portrays the image of a perfect gentleman, would have been much more straightforward in the answer to the original Dáil question, particularly in view of the fact that in a radio programme on Monday evening the decision which he had made two weeks earlier was being reversed. I would not mind any Minister of any Government being evasive with a tricky question but my question was not a tricky question; it was very straight-forward. Indeed, the "tricky-dicky" answer I got to the question was uncalled for.
That might be bad enough but there is far more to this than meets the eye because in connection with the announcement made in regard to the school one would think that nobody had the least interest in it except the Fine Gael TD for the constituency. I understand, of course, that he was always interested in keeping this school open. He was. That is so, as I was and as my colleague also was. We did our best at all times to make sure that the wishes of the parents were made fully clear to the Minister for Education, in particular, Deputy Faulkner.
I must say that I welcome very sincerely the reversal of the earlier decision by Deputy Burke as the Fine Gael Minister for Education and, of course, I welcome the news that the Adare CB post-primary school will be allowed to function as it has functioned over the years. Of course, the parents, teachers and students are very happy that the Minister, Mr. Burke, has seen the light and has adopted the only sensible course open to him. I am amazed that these weeks of frustration and annoyance to parents, teachers and pupils in Adare should have been caused because the plain fact of the matter is that Minister Burke made an obvious blunder in closing this long-established and very successful secondary school. This blunder is clearly seen by all, in particular by the Minister, who reversed his two-week old decision to close the school.
Everyone assumes that before a Minister of State makes a decision —in this case a decision of importance to the people of Adare because it affects many people there—the Minister, being the responsible person that he should be, would have thoroughly investigated all aspects of the situation and made his decision on that basis. The fact that he has reversed his earlier decision so rapidly would suggest that either he did not thoroughly examine all aspects of the case or that he makes decisions on grounds other than the educational requirements. In either instance, this type of bungling and ad hoc decisionmaking can result only in unnecessary anxiety and frustration for parents, teachers and students. This total lack of clear thinking and educational planning is what we have now come to expect from the Minister for Education, Deputy Burke. It is typical of so many of the actions of the Minister. Another glaring example of this, in the same area, in the same parish, is the Shountrade national school. The people of Adare know the facts about their secondary school. For the first time ever their school was officially closed by a Fine Gael Minister in a Coalition Government.
In the week that this fact was made public in the Limerick Leader, I put down a parliamentary question on the subject to the Minister for Education. I asked when the decision to close St. Joseph's CB secondary school, Adare, County Limerick, was conveyed to (a) the school management and (b) the parents' committee. This was a straightforward question which any 12-year-old pupil could answer. However, the Minister replied as follows:
I have been in further correspondence with the manager of the school and I am not, therefore, in a position now to give any positive indication regarding the future of this school.
I am quoting from column 388 of the Official Report of 5th July, 1973. This reply was a refusal by the Minister to answer a simple, straightforward question. Everyone knows that negotiations of any kind have nothing to do with the date I requested. By answering my parliamentary question as he did, the Minister, in refusing to give me information to which I am entitled as an elected representative, treated the Dáil with contempt. Knowingly and deliberately, for reasons that are suspect, he undermined the whole system of parliamentary questions on which democracy, to a very considerable extent, is based. He showed a complete disregard for our parliamentary system because his answer to my question was tantamount to a deliberate lie——
The Deputy should not attribute to the Minister that he was telling an untruth.
Not telling an untruth, but it was tantamount to that. My parliamentary question was not answered even though the information was readily available. The reply about negotiations going on was totally misleading. I am assured that the Fine Gael Deputy for the constituency was able to produce a copy of a letter sent by the Minister for Education on the same day that my parliamentary question was answered. It was a copy of a letter sent to the school manager saying the Minister had changed his mind and that the Adare CBS was no longer closed. Naturally, the Fine Gael Deputy proudly and loudly announced his Minister's intentions regarding the school but, in fairness to him, I must add he asked that everything be kept secret for a few days so that the Minister might get off the hook of my parliamentary question. Of course he failed because secret news always travels fast.
I am told there were hurried phone calls from Dublin to Adare on the morning of my parliamentary question. These calls show clearly that the Minister made yet another monumental boob and once again was forced to reverse a decision.
Was there phone tapping?
I hope that people in other parts of the country will not think from the Adare experience that so far as the Minister for Education is concerned local agitation is the only consideration in the opening or closing of schools. The Adare CBS has has never been a political football so far as I am concerned and it will never be one. However, to those who try to chalk up a political gain here for the Fine Gael Deputy in the constituency, I would remind them that the people of Adare will not be fooled.
The whole thing smells. I would not have expected it from the Minister for Education; I would have expected much more from him. I am told that the radio programme on Monday evening, the Provincial News Round-up, was recorded the previous Saturday evening, that the people in Adare knew on Thursday evening of the Minister's reversal of his two-weeks' old decision but when a Deputy asked a parliamentary question on the matter I was not given the information to which I was entitled. If this is the kind of "tricky-Dicky" answers we will get from the Minister, Deputies on this side of the House will listen to every word he says but, because of his actions, we will not be able to trust anything he says. We all know he has made a "hames" of the educational policy; we know that the stop/go policy, the reversing and going forward, is lunacy. Decisions should be made only when all the facts are considered carefully. This has not happened——
What about Fianna Fáil when they were in government?
(Interruptions.)
Order. There must not be interruptions in a limited debate of this kind.
If parliamentary questions are ignored, if the Minister does not carry out his duties and obligations to this House, if he gives to his colleagues information he refuses to give to this Parliament, he is not fulfilling his duties to the Dáil. In the matter we are now discussing, the news was in Limerick before I got there——
You should know all about that.
It was a despicable action and I hope that it will not happen again.
I shall avoid replying to the more personal matters raised by the Deputy. As he had the graciousness to withdraw his remarks about the Chair we might have hoped he would have continued in the same vein for the 20 minutes during which he was speaking.
My reply to the question put down by Deputy Collins on 5th July, 1973, regarding the CBS at Adare was as follows:
I have been in further correspondence with the manager of the school and I am not, therefore, in a position now to give any positive indication regarding the future of the school.
That was the position at the time and that is the position now. Therefore, that demolishes completely the case raised by the Deputy. As the Deputy is aware, the decision to close the secondary top division of the school was taken by my predecessor as far back as 1967——
The school never closed.
Mr. R. Burke
A reprieve of three years, subsequently extended to five years, was granted to give the local parents' committee an opportunity to prove their contention that the enrolment would build up to such as would warrant its continuance. These expectations were not realised nor did there seem to be any circumstances or indication that would justify a departure from the decision already made and, so, the school authorities were notified on May 4th, 1973, that it was proposed to withdraw recognition from the school at the end of the current school year.
I am beginning to worry about the Minister.
Mr. R. Burke
However, on the day before that on which Deputy Collins's question was answered in the House by me, certain information came to my notice—this information is there for Deputy Collins to consider after we finish here tonight—which I considered warranted my giving the matter further consideration.
The Minister is again trying to mislead the House.
Order.
On a point of order——
In a limited debate of this kind there must be no interruptions.
Mr. R. Burke
I have said to Deputy Collins that, despite the remarks he has made here tonight, I am prepared, when we leave this Chamber, to show him the exact wording——
Is it the same as appears in The Irish Press?
Let the Minister put it on the record.
Mr. R. Burke
I entered into further correspondence with the manager of the school, indicating that a further moratorium in relation to the closing of the school would be given—note the words: "a further moratorium" on the decision—in order that discussions might proceed during the coming school year. I repeat now what I said on Thursday last—and the fact that the Deputy was not here on that occasion to pursue the matter by way of supplementary questions is of no consequence—that is, that I am not in a position now to give any positive indication regarding the future of the school.
Tell us what was in the letter Deputy Jones brought to Limerick that night.
We must not have interruptions of this kind.
Mr. R. Burke
It seems to me that the posturing of Deputy Collins here this evening arises from pique that he has been denied the opportunity of making political capital out of the Adare school situation as he would, obviously, have tried to do had I endorsed, without further investigation, the decision by his fellow partyman, the former Minister.
The former Minister did not close Adare school. The present Minister has done that.
Would Deputy Collins please desist from interrupting?
Mr. R. Burke
It seems to me, also, that the Deputy is manifesting an attitude that characterised the Fianna Fáil general approach to the closing of schools——
(Interruptions.)
Would Deputies please allow the Minister to complete his remarks?
Mr. R. Burke
——to disregard the wishes of the school authorities and, particularly, of the parents, except in those instances where it would be unwise, politically, to do so.
The closing or discontinuance of any school is no small matter and a decision to close a school should not be taken—and as far as I am concerned, will not be taken—lightly. I will review the case of the Adare school in the light of all available relevant information. In the meantime I have postponed a final decision as to the future of the school. I do not believe that the educational interests of any person will be affected adversely by my postponing the decision.
Did the Minister close the school officially?
Order, please. The Minister, without interruption.
Mr. R. Burke
If the Deputy is dissatisfied with that, that is his concern and I do not propose to depart from what I believe to be right in order that Deputy Collins may be less unhappy. I have not misinformed anyone.
The Minister is continuing to misinform us.
Order.
Mr. R. Burke
I have not misled anyone. It may be that, ultimately, I shall find it desirable, on educational grounds, to discontinue the recognition of the secondary top division in the Christian Brothers' school at Adare. On the other hand, it may be that I shall find that the post-primary educational requirements of the district can be served suitably by the retention of the present provision. My decision will not be made until all relevant considerations are fully weighed and assessed.
The Minister made a decision two weeks ago when he closed the school officially.
The Minister, without interruption.
What about the letter the Minister sent out?
Mr. R. Burke
That is why I am not in a position now to give any positive indication regarding the future of the school. These were precisely the terms of the reply I gave to Deputy Collins on Thursday last.
The Dáil adjourned at 11 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 12th July, 1973.