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Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 28 Nov 1990

Vol. 126 No. 14

Equality of Education: Motion.

I move:

That Seanad Éireann deplores the failure of the Minister for Education to ensure equality of educational provision for all students irrespective of the sex, and socio-economic background of the students, and calls on the Minister:

(a) to make available the required number of teachers to reduce the size of classes to reasonable levels;

(b) to provide specialist teachers for remedial work, guidance counselling and other specialist areas at both primary and post-primary levels;

(c) to provide modern educational facilities in all schools including science and language laboratories, physical education facilities and technology rooms;

(d) to eliminate all sub-standard school buildings;

(e) to extend the second level school cycle to six years so that all students can avail of a six year cycle;

(f) to provide educational specialist support for educationally disadvantaged students;

(g) to provide support for teachers through a comprehensive system of in-service education; and

(h) to provide adequate funding for all schools enabling them to provide an education of equity for all students.

It is agreed that there should be 15 minutes for each speaker with the exception of Senator Jackman who has 30 minutes to introduce the motion.

May I have the order of speakers?

Acting Chairman

What normally happens is that we call on a Fine Gael Senator, in this case Senator Jackman, to move the motion. It will be seconded formally. Senator Jackman has 30 minutes. When she concludes we will call a Fine Gael Senator to second the motion and that Senator has 15 minutes, then a Fianna Fáil Senator will be called for 15 minutes to move the amendment and then the Minister will be called.

That is fine. Thank you.

I welcome the Minister and her announcement to introduce a comprehensive education Act preceded by a consultative Green Paper before next May and followed by a White Paper six months later. It is a courageous step and she is to be congratulated on her initiative. It will open up a much needed debate on education which has been sought by everyone involved in the education system. The debate will not be of exclusive interest to educationists and elected representatives alone. Trade union groups, church authorities, parents, employers and the nation as a whole have a deep interest in contributing to legislation which will incorporate objectives, policy and aspirations for educational development. I hope the Green Paper and White Paper will be issued quickly and that the problems in education, which need instant solutions, will not be shelved. I hope the proposed education Act will not become a smoke-screen for inactivity.

Having Fine Gael Private Members' time to highlight the continuing crisis in education is a response to repeated calls from this side of the House for a debate on education. Senators here this evneing have continually called for that debate. I ask the Leader of the House to respond by providing time for a debate not just in Private Members' time as requested by Senators Costello, O'Toole, the Independent Senators and various educationists on both sides of the House.

No, as soon as possible. This is the first debate we have had following——

We had a debate——

This is the second debate in relation to education which is very little when you think that we have been sitting for over 12 months. Other items are debated on a weekly basis but this is only the second time education has come up for discussion.

In deploring the failure of the Minister to ensure equality of educational provision for all students irrespective of the sex and socio-economic background of the student, we in Fine Gael have set out a number of requests as outlined in the motion. I may be accused of seeking the ideal but I make no apology. The fact that there is such a long list in the motion shows how little has been achieved by the Minister since she took office. Nothing on the list is superfluous. It contains the basic needs in education from the practical base of safe, well-heated classrooms to the provision of resources and facilities to make the educational experience of all students relevant, practical and meaningful. They are not lordly objectives. They are basic aspirations.

Before I go on to treat some of the demands in detail — other speakers will deal with their hobby horses such as first and third level education — I would like to make some overall points on the education system. A critical stage has now been reached in the evolution of that system. Over the period of the next decade it is imperative that every consideration be given to ensuring that our system of education is in a state of cultivated preparedness to take on the challenges that are to be anticipated with the dawning of a new century. While it is acknowledged that a series of investigative action of sorts has been underway for some years now, it is to be regretted that only the report of the primary school curriculum review body is, as yet, to hand. We are awaiting the publication of the OECD report on the Irish education system and the report of the primary school review. It is widely known, through leaks to the press, that the work of both commissions has been completed. The delay in presenting these findings is difficult to understand. It is to be urged, therefore, that no further delay in this regard be countenanced. Let the debate begin and transfer the plans into practice.

The fact that three major investigations into the fortunes of our education system were set underway contemporaneously is indicative of a well-founded apprehension that all is not well on the education front. The issuing of the reports in a piecemeal fashion does not augur well for the future as the stamina to approach the underlying problems will be dissipated for want of an overall coherent plan of campaign. It if for this reason that the Education Act is welcome and, hopefully, it will address the issues of concern with the full rigours of legislation, enshrining in law what is and what is not acceptable practice.

The education system has lurched from trough to trough with a series of Departmental circulars symbolic of the adhocery that has prevailed for far too long. Consequently the fabric of Irish education has been frayed. It is without shape. It lacks the clarity of conviction which renders it blind to the process of advanced planning. As the recommendations of the review bodies are awaited it will be acknowledged universally that a major investment in support systems is urgently required. No legislation, no matter how eloquent its aspirations, can be carried through to realistic accomplishment without a dynamic ancillary structure.

It may well be that the Department of Education should not be left alone in pursuit of these reforms but the Minister will have full Cabinet support in this most important undertaking. As far as I am concerned, and I sure all Senators would also agree, education should be the concern of all Departments.

On the international scale of rating it is accepted that the Irish educational system is quite respectable in many of its accomplishments. This has been largely due to the professional competence of the teaching force at all levels. It is widely recognised that Irish teachers are characterised by the energy of their commitment and the creativity of their teaching, coupled with a strong sense of vocation. The pressures which they are now expected to sustain in overcrowded classrooms, in a society which is becoming increasingly complex, cannot clearly be endured for much longer.

It is a popular public perception that reduced class sizes lightens the workload of the teacher whereas, in fact, the converse is the case. Reduced class size offers the opportunity for new prospects for both pupil and teacher. It allows for less directed learning, pacing at an individual rate, higher levels of participation for pupils and teacher, more creative pedagogy and the prospect of ranging wider than the prescribed course. This replaces alienation for a child with a sense of belonging and a sense of achievement. It makes the schoolgoing experience more productive at an inter-personal level. Smaller classes, I am sure everybody would agree, connect school and life. For the teacher this is a most demanding range of targets, yet it is more fulfilling professionally and personally. Educationally it provides a sounder base for development. To ignore these exciting possibilities, to fail to reduce class size at a time when well qualified talented young teachers are so widely available can only be described as wanton waste. It is a travesty of the Irish education system whose proud lineage can be traced back over centuries. We can go back to the Island of Saints and Scholars.

The saints have gone.

In relation to that, the real wealth of this system has always been the integrity of its teaching force. Under present conditions this is not something which will continue without careful cultivation and renewal. All we have to do is look at Britain where they had a very respectable education system which alas, is not the case now. The status of teachers in Britain is exceptionally low. We have been forewarned. We have taken a lot of our education input from Britain, particularly from the Scottish system which, because of its slight independence, has still managed to remain respectable. I would not like the Irish education system to go the way the system across the way has gone. Unleash the potential now.

That leads me to refer to the young, unemployed teachers with their much needed contribution. Unfortunately many of these teachers if they wish to continue in education have to do so abroad. It is our greatest resource. We are all getting old and as I have stated before here in relation to the superannuation——

Nonsense, Senator.

We have a Sir Galahad.

I accept the compliment but unfortunately I will age like the rest. Teachers in the primary and post-primary sectors are aging. They are not as vibrant and do not have the same energy that they had. Young teachers need to be brought into the system now.

Fine Gael requested the Minister to reduce the pupil-teacher ratio to 19:1. The cost implications are not great, less than £2 million, as a considerable number of posts would be filled by redeployment. The Minister gave a commitment to primary schools, and honoured it, under the Programme for National Recovery. Post-primary schools today have to meet challenges and demands from pupils and parents for the introduction and extension of the curriculum in the subject areas of modern languages, technology, science and business studies. All of these are of vital importance to our economic development as we move towards the single market in 1992. If we look at the increase in pupils over the last number of years, 1982-89, it is interesting to see that there was an increase of 22,000 when the number of secondary teachers decreased by exactly 196, rounded off at 200. We are talking about a 14 per cent increase in the number of pupils and a 4 per cent increase in the number of teachers. Those facts speak for themselves. I do not call them statistics, they are facts. In relation to community schools, 26 permanent appointments were made between 1987 and 1988 and 12 permanent appointments between 1989 and 1990. That happened as a result of the application of the 20:1 ratio.

I missed the statistic given by the Senator. Was it 1982 to 1989?

Ninteen eighty-two to 1989 for both. The pupil numbers increased by 14 per cent and the teacher numbers increased by 4 per cent.

Thank you.

The pupil-teacher ratio in Ireland is one of the highest in Europe. We have a 20:1 ratio; Greece, 17:1 — I am talking about poor countries not rich countries, the peripheral countries have managed to raise the status of education — France, 17:1; Portugal, 14:1, whose economy is as poor as our own, if not worse; Germany, 13:1; the United Kingdom, 13:1; Luxembourg, 11:1 and Italy 10:1. Those facts speak for themselves.

Restrictions on the number of teachers a school can employ via the quota system has resulted in many schools doing without vital education services. Out of a total of 809 second level schools, 308 were ex-quota vice-principals, 302 ex-quota career guidance, 252 ex-quota remedial teachers and 85 ex-quota remedial guidance resource.

I will not talk about school secretaries or school caretakers. They come under the same cutbacks. There has been a drop of 24 school secretaries between 1987 and 1989 and 35 school caretakers in the same two years.

I turn now to in-service — call it renewal. It is essential to have a well-structured and scheduled framework for in-service education and training. Preservice programmes will always be inadequate to the changing demands made on teachers over a professional lifetime. There will be problems if increased funding is not made available for in-service education. As a teacher, I speak from experience. Teachers can easily become conservative because of the lack of in-service training. We lose the quality of risk-taking and fail to avail of opportunities for moments of inspired learning, engagement and excitement. This failure, it must be said, is often the mark of the over-crowded classroom. It is often, too, the mark of the beaten down teacher. It is not that the teacher is conservative by nature but rather that all the forces are working against him or her. To remain accomplished in the art of teaching requires the updating of skills and knowledge. It means expanding the pedagogical repertoire of teachers. It means an ability to contribute to educational planning. I will emphasise that again because planning is essential, both at school and other levels.

Teachers must be encouraged to explore the present. If you look at the world of business, the most successful businesses, industries and economies regard in-service training as essential and commonplace. Education, which is a vital social aspect of the system, must act likewise. The call for in-service must go further. Models of in-service must be designed. They must be positioned in a detailed way, in a planning forward exercise and not be a model of the crash course variety, which has happened over the last number of years. Colleges of education and university departments of education eagerly await an official brief from the Minister's Department in this regard. To delay any further might well be to yield ground that may never be regained. It is virtually impossible — I do not wish to appear negative — to revitalise an education system when it grinds to a halt. I refer to Britain where the new British Prime Minister, Mr. Major, will have a very considerable task before him. I hope the same task will not be before our Taoiseach in relation to the continual problems within education.

In relation to major reforms within the area of in-service in the post-primary system at both the junior and senior cycles, in addition to changes in existing subjects new courses and subjects are introduced each year, especially in the areas of languages, technology and vocational preparation and training programmes. The demand for a wide-ranging curriculum has never been greater. We get demands from industrialists and employers. We get reports here, there and everywhere. We must respond. There must be a Government commitment to increase resources to implement the necessary reforms and innovations.

The most significant of the recent reforms has been the proposal for the new junior certificate exam in 1992 and I would like to hear the Minister's comments on this next week. Initially nine rounds were envisaged for teachers over the three year period of the implementation of this programme and two rounds were given in 1989-90. This year which is the third year and also the crucial year, there was no in-service. We had the controversy over the introduction of the promise of the sample paper which, hopefully, the Minister will bring in before Christmas. It is essential considering the examination will take place soon. There was disagreement regarding the bulk, the size, etc. of the sample paper, and also regarding school-based assessment. This caused difficulties and delay. It is essential that the sample paper be issued immediately. It is now December and there has been no in-service for the junior certificate this year. With the promised introduction of a new senior cycle in 1992 as a continuation of the junior certificate, in-service will obviously be of vital importance in marrying the theory to the practice.

With regard to school resources I am talking about basic resources and not technology and language resources. There are few, if any, imaginative teaching kits, manuals or discussion documents available to inspire teachers or to make them receptive to new ideas or approaches. Those we have, and I am sure Senator O'Toole will talk on this in relation to the primary schools specifically, are imported from Britain and the United States. There is no research unit within the Department which might, in conjunction with teachers and other consultants, devise such materials. I pay tribute to the teachers' centres and those involved in them who are working so hard to provide themselves with in-service kits. It is admirable. It is only what one would expect from teachers but finance must be given to them.

If we look at the curriculum in England, whether we agree with it or not, it has been energetically supported and serviced by a wide range of documentation. By stark contrast our system is totally undernourished and is dependent on a spurious rash of what I consider to be narrowly conceived notes and aids from various publishing houses.

The principal responsibility of a Minister for Education is to provide for schools the basic environment in which teaching and learning can take place unimpeded. Many Irish schools do not have this provision guaranteed and, therefore, they start from well behind. Later I will refer to the need for language laboratories, technology rooms and so on if we are to take our place in 1992 in competition with other EC countries.

The real wealth in Irish eduation is the integrity of the teaching force but this is not something which will continue without careful cultivation and renewal. I call on the Minister to unleash that potential and let the young unemployed teachers make their much-needed contribution in Ireland rather than in the far-flung fields where they now have to venture if they wish to pursue careers in teaching.

I turn briefly to career guidance counsellors. I emphasise the word "counsellor" because the emphasis always seems to be on career guidance and also the quota teaching provisions where specialist teaching service is now available only on an ex-quota basis in schools of 500 plus pupils. In a time of high unemployment and when there is such demand for places in higher level education, the reduction in ex-quota teachers is inexplicable, particularly in the area of career guidance. Take the workload of the average career guidance counsellor. Expertise and professionalism are required in the constant review of entry requirements to third level institutions. There are the needs of industry and employment opportunities. Teachers try to gear females to male-oriented jobs and away from traditional careers which are no longer options on the jobs market. As we know, there are very few positions available in the areas of teaching, nursing and in the public service.

A one-to-one relationship is essential between the teacher and the student. I am talking about careers. I have a particular interest in the counselling area having taught in an inner city school for 25 years where parents did not place much value in education. One could say that the counselling aspect of career guidance is the Cinderella. Now more than at any other time urgent counselling, advice and support is essential on a one-to-one basis. It is not just students from lower socio-economic backgrounds who need that, it is students from all backgrounds. There are broken homes in all sectors of society and not just in the lower socio-economic area. There are high levels of unemployment in areas where little value is placed on educational achievement.

The need for professional, specialist advice from the career guidance teacher cannot be ignored. The career guidance teacher is already overburdened trying to address career options, subject options and form filling. How many students still do not fill in the CAO forms properly despite the enormous efforts of the career guidance teacher? We have calls from Galway each year asking if teachers and parents would sit them down and help them fill out the forms. Mistakes are still made despite the input made by the career guidance teacher and others in that area. The poor career guidance teacher also has to put on career exhibitions. Counselling is very much in demand and was never more needed.

The structure of school buildings is a matter about which I feel much concern. I have spoken to teachers who do not wish to spend a lifetime teaching in prefabricated buildings. I spent 25 years teaching in such buildings and I survived but it cannot be tolerated any more. Last May 578 second level schools were surveyed and of those who responded 40 per cent hold classes in prefabricated buildings — 80 per cent of those for four years or more; 20 per cent for ten years; 42 per cent for 16 years or more. When I went to companies who specialise in the construction of prefabricated buildings, I was told that their lifespan was 10 to 15 years. Prefabricated buildings over 15 years old are certainly not safe. The Minister was present for an Adjournment debate which centred on a school in Richill, Castleconnell, in the east Limerick constituency where the prefab was blown down. Fortunately the children were at home; they had a day off. Otherwise there would have been many fatalities. We are talking about highly dangerous buildings. I mentioned that there are 35 fewer caretakers. Schools are not maintained properly and they are deteriorating rapidly. There is a golden opportunity for the building industry to bloom in the construction of schools.

I will not be put off by demographic trends. People who have emigrated may not come back to this country. The greatest specialists in projection have stated that you cannot accept more than a year or two of demographic projection. At second level there will not be any sizeable reduction in student numbers. A huge number of students will go through the system in the next ten years. These buildings are needed. They cannot exist in prefabs.

As regards facilities, I am not talking about high technology rooms but about basic equipment that I would expect to find in second level schools. If we want girls to avail of male-oriented subjects we must have technology rooms for them. One school in the city of Limerick which collected £300,000 to build a gym found when they made approaches to the Department of Education for equipment and basic furniture, that they could not have it because it was an unauthorised building. I find it extraordinary. The parents contributed the full cost of that gym and they were told it was unauthorised. I do not know what that term is supposed to mean. It could mean anything. All it meant to that poor principal was that he was not able to put in the furniture and had to go back to the parents again.

In relation to finance, at a cumulative rate of inflation over a decade of 124.7 per cent the capitation grant would need to be £224 to keep pace with changes in the real value of money. I want to make a particular point regarding parents' contributions. There is indirect taxation. If 55 per cent of schools contribute £25, that makes £5 million plus fees paid by students and I am talking in terms of £2.45 million in relation to students who sat the intermediate and leaving certificates. If you were to round it off, you are talking in terms of almost £10 million. There are other areas where parents contribute, taxpayers' money, PAYE workers by and large. That is indirect taxation. Let us admit it. Parents are paying for quality education. The sad part is that there are many schools where parents cannot pay and so there is inequality. There are students who will not have those facilities as a result of not being able to contribute the moneys they should.

With reference to the six year cycle, that option is not very expensive. It would cost around £3 million if it were to be provided for all students. If you think in terms of our second level education and its lifespan for students, let us look at the figures: Ireland, five; Belgium, six; France, seven; Greece, six — Greece, as a poor country, can afford six years — Italy seven to eight; The Netherlands, six; the UK, seven; West Germany, nine. Irish students finish their post-primary education at a far earlier age than do their European counterparts. In Ireland it is 17 years of age; Belgium, 18 plus; France, 18 plus; Greece, 17.5 plus; Italy, 18 to 19; The Netherlands, 18 plus; United Kingdom, 18 plus; West Germany, 19. We are the poor relation when it comes to keeping our students at school.

Despite all of this, we still have half of the schools providing students with the option of taking the following programmes: VPT, third year leaving certificate, the transition year, and going through all those options which will become part of the senior cycle when it is addressed. There is a very good consultative paper from the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment and I would go along with most of what they said in this paper issued in May 1990. They are advocating the six year cycle with the opportunity for students to move over and back, to have fluidity, mobility, to have students that are vocationally oriented, perhaps not very academic, to pick and choose from the various routes they suggest in that document.

I appeal to the Minister to have a debate in this House on the whole ethos of that senior cycle when it follows through — as hopefully it will — in 1992 after the revamped junior cycle. I call on the Minister to look now, not in 1992, for the resources to ensure that when this senior cycle comes on stream teachers will be able to avail of in-service training to make it suitable to students. The one point I would make very strongly is that the system as it stands at senior cycle level is not relevant to the needs of many of our students.

I have taught the senior cycle programme which, I found, kept the students of the school in which I taught in Limerick off the streets. They would have left because up to intermediate certificate the education system was largely irrelevant to their needs. They would have been among a high percentage of drop-out students without qualifications or any form of employment except that the school had a pilot programme for senior certificate, the students took it, they found it relevant to their needs, they found skills other than academic rote learning, memory, analysis and all the other things we find in the academic leaving certificate and tested only by the leaving certificate. Those students could go into the community and be accepted. They could do a good day's work when they were offered work placement. They found that they had a value on themselves, their confidence was enlarged and they had a role in life.

That is one aspect of the various options within senior cycle that I feel should be kept intact in the revamping of the senior cycle. The reason I say that is because we must not underestimate those 80 per cent of students who do not go on to third level. The whole emphasis in education debate in this country seems to be permanently on points and entry to third level education. We must look towards the 80 per cent who have cooperative skills and practical skills. They feel rejected and dejected unless they have relevant progress adapted to their needs.

There are many other things I would like to say to the Minister. There is a golden opportunity between this and the introduction of the Education Act for widespread debate. This is really only introductory from my point of view. I hope the Leader of the House will initiate a debate in this House so that as Oireachtas Members we will be prepared. It will be the role of Oireachtas Members to contribute to a wide-ranging debate on education, and it should not be debated exclusively by educationalists and Oireachtas Members but by the country as a whole. It was stated already today in a previous debate that the country as a whole is absolutely obsessed with education.

There is no point in saying that we cannot give resources for the next ten years. For every parent and every student you get one educational experience in your lifetime. Projections about demography and fixing everything at the end of the day are not acceptable. You get your chance and you take it. Most of us, whether positively or negatively, have been affected by our educational experience.

I formally second the motion proposed by Senator Jackman. It is ironic that in a State which was founded in the main by educationalists we should today be addressing the question of a severe lack of education opportunity. I would put it to you that the Thomas Davis axiom that you educate so that people may be free rings hollow today. I put it to the Minister, not in a personal but in a political way, that she is missing a golden opportunity in her Ministry at the moment. I urge her to embrace this opportunity, to use equality of education opportunity as a mechanism to allow upward mobility for people in society, to allow a better social mobility, to give people a better opportunity for quality of life and in career later. It is my contention that no amount of personal intervention, no amount of intervention schemes or intervention by social workers or by a battery of experts, paramedics or whatever, will ever undo the damage in an adult person of a lack of opportunity of a really good education as a young person. We cannot deny tonight that education is the vehicle to liberate people, to give people equality of opportunity and to bring in a truly classless society.

I remind the House that our primary school sector is beset by vastly oversized classes. The average class size is well in excess of 30. The bulk of classes in this country have in the region of 39 to 40 pupils. This results in a situation where pupils have five minutes of individual attention and personal contact with the teacher in the day. That is a criminal situation. We have the worst possible class sizes in contemporary Europe. The average in most mainland European countries is in the region of 30 pupils per class. I urge the Minister to rectify this position immediately. It is a wonderful opportunity for us, at this stage in the development of our State, to tackle this issue. We have criminally large class sizes against a backdrop of a £60 million investment in young teachers who are working outside this country. The output from that £60 million investment is not available to this country at the moment. As a mechanism to refashion our education service we have to look at class size.

Following the issue of class size we must look at the whole area of the remedial teacher. At the moment there are 800 remedial teachers working in this country. Each of them is responsible for about 30 pupils. In an ideal society we want a numerate and a literate people. That is not a contention anyone would argue with. Unfortunately, quite a proportion of people are not fit to master the complex skills involved in reading. They need remedial help. I put it to the Minister, with all the sincerity at my command, that we have not a sufficient number of remedial teachers working in this country.

If there is a problem with remedial teachers in the urban centres, there is a chronic problem in rural Ireland with remedial education. In many parts of rural Ireland there are no remedial teachers working at all. Where you have a remedial teacher, that person is working in three or four schools and, as somebody representing a rural constituency and coming from a rural constituency, I refuse to accept the logic of an argument that says that there are not remedial problems out there in rural Ireland. At a time of chronic poverty, income problems and of hopelessness resulting from emigration, I would contend that in the outposts of rural Ireland there are many pupils in need of remedial attention. I put it to the Minister that therein also lies an opportunity for her to grasp. That is a really important matter.

I move next to something that I believe in passionately and that is that at the centre of a progressive education system should be an adequate number of properly qualified teachers. No amount of modern, sophisticated technology is a substitute for the teachers in the classrooms. I am glad to see that the Minister is nodding. There is no way that anyone can rationally argue that there is a substitute for having the right number of teachers in our classrooms.

The next priority, obviously, has to be books and the range of books available to young people, particularly to pupils who will come from the disadvantaged homes where those books will not be available. I say with great sadness to this House, and it is a source of great annoyance to me, that I draw the attention of this House to the fact that the children who get the book grant at the moment, who are in chronic need, receive an average amount of £7 per head. Any primary teacher in Ireland will tell you, any parent will tell you and any bank manager dealing with overdrafts will tell you that the least possible expenditure on primary school books is £30 and it is massively higher than second level. I put it to the Minister today that we have to increase the book grant for pupils in need and, if we have to increase the book grant, we must also improve our library facilities for pupils and the library facilities in our community. I return to my basic contention that if you want to achieve mobility in society, if you want to achieve an egalitarian society, if you want to achieve social justice, the vehicle by which to do so, is the education system.

I would also put it to the Minister that there will have to be a new injection, that there is a chronic need for an injection into the capital programme in schools. I hope that the new Health and Safety Act will be applied to our schools. I would want to be assured in the House that it will apply to our schools. It is my view that if it is applied to our schools with the proper vigour then there will have to be an increased capital programme resulting from that because there is need for new classrooms out there. There is need to get rid of old pre-fabs. There is need for improvement in that area and, unfortunately, in recent times we have had a weakening of the capital input to our schools sector and it is extremely important that that is redressed.

Having identified serious problems in the primary sector in terms of class size, in terms of books, book availability to poorer children, in terms of the capital programme and in terms of general investment, I now want to address the question of the in-service training of our teachers. There is no programme — and I do not want the Minister to attempt to inform us otherwise, I know she will not — of proper in-service training of teachers in existence in this country. I know from the leaks coming from the OECD reports through the national media that there is a massive need for investment in in-service training. I refer to in-service training within the schools and in-service training in colleges throughout this country. We have identified a chronic problem in the primary sector and that problem is central to the fact that most of the children of the "ordinary" families of Ireland are not in our third level colleges.

If there is a problem in the primary sector, there is also a problem in the secondary sector. It is my contention that the big problem at the moment in second level education, in vocational and traditional secondary schools, is that the shortage of teachers there is resulting in a reduction of subjects available to the pupils. We are back to the core traditional academic subjects and there is a shortage of art, music, all the areas of artistic creativity that are so central to personal development and which offer important career opportunities in a modern society to so many pupils who do not want to spend their time in the very traditional academic spheres. I think that that is a chronic problem.

I am of the view that there is a breakdown of an imaginative, broadly based curriculum in our second level schools because of the lack of teaching personnel there. In the mid-seventies, Dr. Patrick Clancy of UCD established beyond yea or nay that in our universities there was a clear absence of any meaningful segment of the working class people of this country and he identified in that the urban working class particularly. It is still tragically the case, and no Member of this House can escape from that reality, that in our third level colleges at the moment we do not have enough people from the rural poor, from small farming backgrounds, from urban working class backgrounds.

I had occasion to go through the UCD campus recently and it reminded me of an underground station in London; it is so vastly overcrowded at the moment that it is like Piccadilly Circus. My basic contention is this: that because we have not invested and are not showing signs of properly investing in the primary sector, and because that is not being followed on, the lack of investment creates ongoing problems in the secondary sector. Therein lies the reason that we are not getting a higher number of people from disadvantaged backgrounds in third level education.

I put it to the Minister that she is missing — I urge her to change her direction on this one — an opportunity to use the education system to create a genuinely just society in this country.

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all words after "Seanad Éireann" and substitute the following:

"notes that almost 20 per cent of the overall provision for net Government Expenditure on Supply Services for 1990 is allocated to Education

and commends the Minister for Education:

for keeping education policy under ongoing review;

for ensuring high quality broadly based education for all ability levels during the compulsory cycle of education;

for increasing resources in order to cater for the needs of pupils with educational difficulties;

for reform measures which encourage and facilitate pupils to continue in full-time education after compulsory schooling in programmes suited to their aptitudes and abilities; and

for ensuring the participation of concerned interests in the development of the Irish education system.

I welcome the fact that this motion and the amendment which has been tabled by the Leader of the House provide the Seanad with an opportunity for a wide-ranging debate on a number of aspects of our education service. This debate is timely in view of the announcement earlier this week by the Minister for Education that a comprehensive Education Bill is being planned by the Government. Indeed, I welcome this announcement and I congratulate the Minister on the announcement. I also welcome the fact that the presentation of the Education Bill to the Oireachtas will be preceded by the issuing of a Green Paper/Discussion Document in the middle of next year and by a White Paper/Policy Document early in 1992. The timetable which the Minister outlined in her announcement will enable the widest possible debate to take place and will facilitate discussion and consultation between all the various interests involved in Education. The fact that the report of the Review Body on the Primary Curriculum has already been published and that a number of other reports including the report of the Primary Education Review Body, are due to be published shortly will also facilitate such a debate.

Everybody with an interest in education will welcome the decision by the Minister and the Government to bring forward a comprehensive education Act. I certainly know, and I am sure Senator O'Toole will agree, that this decision will be widely welcomed in the INTO, as indeed it will be by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. I look forward to a major debate in this House on the Green Paper when it is published. I feel certain that time will be made available by the Leader of the House for such a debate. The first point I want to make in relation to the motion is that nobody has done more than the present Minister for Education to ensure equality of educational provision for all students irrespective of their sex or socio-economic background.

I will outline some of the steps the Minister has taken over the past year towards this end. One hundred extra teachers were allocated to schools serving disadvantaged pupils. The special fund for disadvantaged schools was trebled to £1.5 million. New criteria have been agreed for assessing the degree of disadvantage in primary education. A circular has been issued to each primary school inviting the school authorities to submit a completed application form to the Department if it is considered that the school is disadvantaged. Agreement has been reached on the appointment of home-school liaison teachers to cater for 18,000 children in 30 disadvantaged primary schools. The number of remedial teachers in primary schools was increased to 887 during the past year. The Minister increased the grant to primary schools under the free book scheme by 17 per cent in 1989 and by a further 20 per cent in 1990.

In second level schools the free book grant was increased by 20 per cent in 1989 and by almost 24 per cent in 1990. In the case of students moving into third level education, the Minister reduced the academic requirements necessary to qualify for a higher education grant from four honours to two honours. In addition, she has put in train a three year programme to standardise entry qualifications for admission to third level institutions. The number of places in third level colleges has been substantially increased and a greater number than ever of third level students are being financially assisted through higher education grants, regional scholarships or ESF grants.

The success of the Minister in relation to all the areas I have mentioned and many more besides is in sharp contrast to the record of her predecessor over a much longer period of office. It is important to remind ourselves that the total gross provision in the Estimates for the Department of Education this year is almost £1,400 million. Ireland's expenditure on education as a percentage of gross national product is one of the highest in the European Community. Of course, those of us who are involved in education would love to see substantial additional resources allocated to the education service. I am sure the Minister, too, would be delighted to have access to a much larger educational budget but, unfortunately, there is not a bottomless well of Exchequer funds at the Government's disposal. Nevertheless, almost 20 per cent of the overall provision for net Government expenditure on supply services for 1990 is devoted to education.

I will now deal with some of the other matters I referred to in the motion. In relation to the school building programme, I would like to compliment the Minister on the number of new buildings and permanent extensions which have been provided all over the country in the past couple of years. In the primary sector alone, over 240 projects have been undertaken since 1987 and the figure spent since then on primary school building projects is in the region of £80 million. Indeed, I would like to thank the Minister for the extent to which my own county, County Roscommon, has benefited under the school building programme since she came to office. In addition to the various improvement works which she sanctioned for many existing schools throughout the county, she gave the green light for a number of major projects including the new primary schools in Frenchpark and Ballintubber, the new special school in Castlerea, additional classroom accommodation in Scoil Mhuire, Strokestown, and more recently she gave the green light for the new community school in Castlerea. I thank the Minister for all these developments in my county.

In relation to funding for schools, if the resources were available, all of us who are involved in education would like to see capitation grants, particularly in primary schools, substantially increased so that no school would have an inadequate standard of heating, cleaning, maintenance or equipment. In this regard I welcome the fact that the Department have recently initiated a study of funding of primary schools. I understand that a questionnaire to be completed by the school authorities is being sent to a random sample of 1,000 schools. This survey, together with the new criteria which have been agreed for assessing the level of social and economic disadvantage in a school's catchment area, will lead to improved funding arrangements for primary schools over the years ahead. Indeed, I would again like to acknowledge that this Minister did increase the capitation grant by over 10 per cent in 1989 and by almost 6 per cent in 1990. Again, that increase of over 16 per cent in two years is greater than the total increase which was given by her predecessor in office over a four year period. Again, I want to emphasise that in addition to the ordinary capitation grants, schools which have been designated as disadvantaged can receive supplementary grants from the special fund for such items as books, materials and equipment or indeed, special in-service training for teachers in the schools concerned.

The pupil-teacher ratio and class size have also been mentioned. In this regard I would like to quote from the education section of the Programme for Government 1989:

The pupil-teacher ratio at both primary and post-primary level will be reduced in the context of demographic decline. As agreed already with the Central Review Committee, the new Government will implement a reduction of one point at primary level to commence in September 1990 and from 27.6 to 1 at present to approximately 26.7 to 1. A continuing review of the pupil-teacher ratio at primary and post primary levels will take place in consultation with the Central Review Committee with regard to the feasibility of a further reduction under a new programme for national recovery.

I certainly hope that further significant reductions in the pupil-teacher ratio will be negotiated in the context of the new national programme for social and economic development. I am confident that the improving economic situation, combined with declining enrolments, will make this possible. I know this would also be the wish of the Minister. I am satisfied, too, that she will continue to give priority to pupils with educational difficulties and pupils with a handicap, whether it be socio-economic deprivation or mental or physical handicap.

Everyone involved in the education service would wish to see positive discrimination in favour of such pupils. The Minister must be commended for keeping education policy under ongoing review and for ensuring the participation of concerned interests in the development of the Irish education system. By the end of 1990 five reports or studies on primary education will have been published. Already the very fine report of the Review Body on the Primary School Curriculum has been published. Dr. Murphy's report on the Primary Education Review Body is due out shortly. In addition to these, there is a report due from a working party on the establishment of a teachers' council as well as an OECD report and a NESC report on Irish education. All these reports, together with the Green Paper which the Minister proposes to publish next year, will help to ensure that there will be a most wide-ranging public debate on education and on education policy in advance of the publication of the White Paper and the education Bill.

The provision of specialist educational support for certain categories of pupils has also been mentioned. I would like to point out that the Department operate part-time teaching schemes for handicapped and disadvantaged children and also for adults. There is a scheme of funding for tuition in pre-schools catering for traveller children. The post for a national co-ordinator for the education of traveller children and for traveller people has been grant-aided by the Department of Education. There is much specialist educational support available for these disadvantaged categories. I certainly would support very strongly the concept of in-service education and I know the Minister does also because of the fact that teachers and the education system benefit to such an extent from in-service education. I know the Minister increased substantially the provision for in-service education for post-primary teachers in 1990. Admittedly, the courses were organised in order to familiarise teachers with the new junior certificate programme but the whole question of in-service education for primary teachers is, I understand, being dealt with by the Review Body on Primary Education and is also dealt with in the report of the Review Body on the Primary Curriculum. I look forward to the formulation of a policy which will lead to greater in-service education facilities for teachers.

The provision of a six year cycle for all pupils in second level schools has also been referred to and I certainly believe that pupils would benefit from a six year cycle. It would appear that this cycle is operated in many second level schools at the moment. In some cases it is done through the provision of a transition year and in other cases it seems to be operated through the provision of a VPT year or a repeat year. Possibly the financial implications of providing a six year cycle for the remaining second level pupils would not be very great.

In my contribution to this debate I have concentrated mainly on the primary sector. My colleague, Senator McKenna, will I am sure refer to developments in many aspects of the second level sector. We can never get away from the paramount importance of providing the best possible education for our young people in primary schools. As the foreword to the report of the Review Body on the Primary Curriculum states:

Primary education provides the foundation for all subsequent advancement in the education system. The most formative years in a young person's development are spent in primary school.

As I have said, primary education is of paramount importance.

I thank the Minister for her attendance in the House this evening and wish her continued success in the very important office which she holds.

I want to thank the Senators who put down this motion giving us all the opportunity to debate the very important subject of education. Each person who spoke tonight had a vast range of subjects to which to apply their mind and I put it to the Senators here this evening that I would welcome very much if there was a decision to have a debate on education in each session of the Seanad. It would give it an importance in the Oireachtas because sometimes due to the multiplicity of Bills and the system of questions and all the rest in the other House the time is not available. This is for Senators to decide; I am just saying I would be most willing to come if the House decided to have a debate in each session; that is, of course, if I am still around. Whoever might come after me might not want to do it. Perhaps such a debate could deal with one or two aspects. We had a very interesting debate before the summer recess which was confined to a particular sphere and, therefore, was more effective because of its precision. I do not make the suggestion in any sense of criticism but in the belief that it would allow us all to focus on particular aspects as distinct from having a wide-ranging debate.

I am glad to be here. May I say I cannot be here next week. In case it is thought I am going on a junket, having a wonderful time, I should say I will be attending the Council of Ministers of Education meeting in Brussels which is a standing engagement and therefore a statutory one. However, my colleague, Minister of State, Deputy Frank Fahey, will take careful note of what is said. I say this so there will be no loud declamations next week to the effect that the Minister would not see fit to come in, was not interested and would not be here. I am declaring now exactly why I will not be here. I will be about my business, albeit in another country.

The financial allocation to my Department has been moving upwards towards £1,400 million. I say that very deliberately because last night on a television programme I did not get time to correct a statement that it was £1,000 million. It is inching up towards £400 million more than that amount, which is, in any terms, quite an amount of money. Twenty per cent of net Exchequer expenditure on non-capital services will be spent on education. May I remind Senator Jackman and Senator O'Reilly that in 1986 the percentage was 16.2. It is clear that the Government in allocating such a large proportion of financial resources are fully committed to education.

I would like to set out the broad thrust of educational policy which we are following: to provide a broad education for all ability levels during the compulsory cycle; to address the needs of children who are disadvantaged; to facilitate pupils to continue in full time education — and could I say that we have, not just within the European context, but within the OECD, the highest stay-on rate to the leaving certificate examination or its equivalent final examination in any of the developed countries.

Within that broad statement of policy I can inform the House of what is being achieved in specific areas. This has been mentioned but I will again put it on the record. The Primary Curriculum Review Body, is working through its activities and will link now with Tom Murphy's report which is a more broadly based report dealing with all other aspects of primary education and which has recently been completed. Senator Jackman said it was completed and on my desk and asked where was it. I have to totally reject that. It is completed. The last meeting has been held. The book has been signed and it is with the printers. I cannot snatch it from them. I expect the report will be presented formally to me within the next few weeks and I look forward to receiving it. It will be carefully considered by the Government and will be discussed with the various interests in education. May I thank the people involved in both the primary curriculum review and in Dr. Murphy's wide ranging review? These persons give an enormous amount of time when we toss out remarks that the review report is nearly ready, we tend to forget the hours, days and weekends of voluntary time spent by the representative interests on those bodies. They do not get paid for it. They do it freely because they have the interests of education at heart. We have the OECD report. The fact that we have so many reports on primary level is very exciting and will provide an informed background and considered recommendations against which to assess the priority needs.

The specific demands set out in the motion before the House as they relate to primary education are, of course, desirable and progressive and will be amply addressed in the reports to which I have referred but I would like to comment in relation to several of the matters. We have already spoken about the Programme for National Recovery and the need for further improvement in the PTR which is at present under discussion. We hope the negotiations at the moment will lead to a new programme. This time it is to be termed the Programme for Economic and Social Development. It will take into account the question of the provision of further remedial teachers and of further teachers for schools in disadvantaged areas.

We have two schemes of assistance in that there is the teaching assistance and financial assistance. We got extra posts into that last year. There is also the scheme of payments. I know I said all that before and Senators have the script. If I seem to skip over some of it, it is not because I am being dismissive; it is that I have so much to say that if I were to read every line I would never get it finished.

There is a major advance in the scheme of financial assistance to which Senator Mullooly referred. Last year the fund was £500,000 and this year it is £1.5 million. Schools will benefit from that extra provision, particularly schools in disadvantaged areas. Assistance has been available for the promotion of home/school/community liaison initiatives and for the relief of school debts. That is for the first time again, I pay tribute to the social partners whose thoughts coincided with my own, that those moneys should be paid directly to the schools affected rather than, as heretofore, through the Church authorities. That has been done for the first time.

The tripling of the funds has enabled me to expand the assistance available to schools and to undertake developmental initiatives. While designation of a school as disadvantaged was formerly on the basis of recommendations, a representative working party recommended earlier this year that it would be on the basis of specified criteria. I have accepted that recommendation and from now on the appointment of extra teachers to disadvantaged areas will be based on those amended and changed criteria which were worked through very carefully by the representative group to find a formula which would be of assistance in doing that.

The motion also refers to specialist teachers for remedial work. The 1,100 primary schools which have the services of a remedial teacher are those which have been identified by my Department as those with the highest priority of need. I agree with Senator O'Reilly that remedial and disadvantaged needs are not exclusive to urban areas, large or small. There are different types of disadvantage. Sometimes there is disadvantage in a city but there can be disadvantage of a different kind in a rural area — perhaps, long distances to school, lack of infrastructure such as central libraries, etc.

I was glad to be in a position in the last school year to sanction an additional 30 remedial posts. We have spoken about that already. We are now discussing those matters under the Programme for National Recovery and I am very hopeful that we will be able to reach fruitful conclusions on the teaching areas to which I have referred.

We have made progress in the psychological services and the pilot schemes have started in the west Tallaght-Clondalkin district and in south Tipperary. The number of children will be calculated and then each project will be evaluated.

There has been much talk about in-service. I agree with both of the Senators who spoke about it that in-service education is important. Senator Jackman referred to it as a process of renewal and regeneration. For teachers it is that. Apart from the curricular changes and the enhancement of skills to cope with curricular changes, there is also the sense of renewal which comes from sharing experiences and talking with other teachers. You talk through difficulties and you relate experiences. In my own teaching years I found that nearly the most important part of in-service was the fact that you were able to talk through your difficulties and work out how you might deal with them. The feeling of isolation which comes from being in charge in a classroom with the door closed is alleviated by professional collaboration and co-operation.

Currently some 2,000 primary teachers annually attend one week summer courses organised by my Department and 7,000 more are attending different types of courses. I recognise completely that more developed and expanded in-service provision is necessary if teachers are to meet adequately the many challenges arising from changes in education. I will consider doing something along the lines recommended to me.

Mention has been made of primary school buildings. This is one of the areas in which I am very pleased at the progress that has been made. We set out to deal with as many schools as possible. Over 230-240 have already been dealt with. People may say that nothing is being spent on primary schools but since I came into office over £80 million has been spent on primary school buildings, which is quite amazing. There are improvement schemes, provision of toilets, heating and lighting — all those that we know about.

Since I came into office we have spent over £105 million on buildings and improvements to second level schools of one kind and another. The new ones that are going up are getting modern facilities and some of these have physical educational facilities. I freely admit that all those looking for those types of specialist activities cannot get them as yet because my first priority is to take children out of prefabs for their teaching hours and then to deal with the other matters.

I am sorry if Senators are sighing and leaning back. They will get their time for speaking later on. The £105 million which has been spent on second level schools has been spent in the areas of greatest need. Senator Jackman quoted a figure of 40 per cent of pupils in second level schools being in prefabs, according to the ASTI survey. Whilst I do not doubt the figures she gave me, it is not that the pupils are all in prefabs. What the Senator omitted to say is that there might be one, two or three classrooms in prefabs. The whole school is not a prefab. We have a great deal more to do in regard to second level building. We will just have to map out a programme and keep at it. I am proud of the £105 million I have spent on it already.

In recent years many schools have had bad accommodation replaced or upgraded. Pupils are now in the second year of the junior certificate programme and it will be examined in 1992. I was interested to hear Senator Jackman say that she understood there was some little difficulty about assessment procedures. There are quite major consultations going on about teacher assessment with outside moderation or monitoring. I am very concerned and anxious that I would get an opportunity to bring it in. I have had major discussions with all of the teaching, management and parental interests on this important topic. Indeed, with some groups I have reached a measure of agreement and I am very appreciative of that. With others we are continuing to talk through the whole matter.

I hope that the deep-seated wish of all of us, that the examination and assessment procedures are brought in line with practices which will most suit the needs of young people, will be fulfilled. I would appeal to all the interests to co-operate in what we are doing and as I said I hope we will come to a conclusion on it. There is no point in having a broadly based curriculum and changing the whole system of the various syllabi if you do not have at the end an examination and assessment mode which suits the changed syllabi.

We have the new subject of technology and 62 schools offered it. Another 60 are involved this year and a further 60 will be involved next year. We are doing that on a very phased and laid out basis. They got the money to go with it. Of course, not enough. Thomond in Limerick and Marino in Dublin have specially funded in-service courses to cope with that new subject.

Turning to the senior cycle the NCCA has published a discussion document. Senator Jackman referred to it and was in agreement with many of the points in it with regard to the senior cycle. I was very impressed last April at the conference by the work that had gone into the senior cycle research which the ASTI had reported in their conference book at that time. Obviously they are ahead of it in that whatever we do in the primary level syllabi has to be matched and expanded in the senior cycle. The council will be turning its attention to this matter. It has already begun and I am meeting them soon. They will be reporting on it.

We have the VPT and the senior certificate referred to by Senator Jackman and she has experience of her own students doing it. It is very worthwhile as are the VPT programmes. The VPT programme was introduced in 1984 and we all know there are now 24,000 young people doing VPT this year at a cost of over £48 million. I want to get national certification for VPT. There are many students doing it. There is a lot of goodwill from the professionals involved. There is much money going into it. Employers are demanding that they see what the young people have done. We hope next September there will be a national system of certification for it.

The leaving certificate programme introduced in September 1989 was a more broadly based, more vocationally related leaving certificate and many schools want to take it up. The VTOS is an opportunity for people to come back into schools. We are hoping for a great increase in numbers in the coming year. Extra teachers were provided for smaller VEC schools and, in particular, the "sole provider" schools. Then there was the increased criteria to which I had already referred. Discussions are now proceeding on a new programme for social and economic development and in those discussions the question of PTR and the provision of teaching posts are among the items on the agenda, along with other matters.

Career guidance and counsellors are another matter. I agree that the component of counselling within that professional scheme is of great importance. The current position is that such teachers are provided ex-quota in schools of 500 pupils or more. This is a reversal of a decision of the Labour and Fine Gael Administration which in the context of the 1987 budget had decided that there would be no ex-quota provision at all for guidance teachers. With regard to remedial education, I consider priority in the provision of remedial teachers must be given on the basis of greatest need. I am speaking here of second level schools. The ex-quota posts were allocated this September to the post-primary sector.

The House will be aware of my particular interest in the promotion of the study of foreign languages. French has been predominant — some would say too much so. In order to promote the introduction of an additional modern Europen language, payments were made, and continue to be made, to certain post-primary schools in respect of the employment of part-time teachers necessary to introduce German, Spanish or Italian. Half of the post-primary schools are providing two languages. When I came into office the number of such schools was 100; it is now 400. In three years there has been that massive increase. Nothing had been done about it. When the Lingua programme starts in January we will have our whole information available. Startling progress has been made. There had been no effort put into it of any kind.

With regard to in-service, I said earlier that the financial provision for this at post-primary level has increased from £300,000 in 1988 to £698,000 in 1989, to £750,000 this year. When I came in three years ago it was £250,000. Deputy John Bruton had provided this in his budget but it is now nearly three or four times that amount. When I hear Deputy John Bruton talking about such things I give a cynical smile. I do think there should be more money spent on in-service and I will try to do something about that. Modern education developments create a need for a comprehensive programme of in-service training particularly in areas such as technology, languages and remedial education.

We have had the recent debate on the six-year cycle. We have had it here before. Half of the post-primary sector offer some kind of six year cycle but a very alarming thing has come to my notice and I want to speak about it freely here in the House. I now find through deputations from parents, teachers and managements that many of the schools offering a transition year are givng it in a formal sense of a three year examination cycle. That was never the purpose of a transition year. A transition year was to be a year where pupils would be free to find out about themselves, and to find out about activities outside of the classroom. Then, I find schools doing 0 levels at the end of the transition year. I find schools who are starting a structured leaving certificate programme proper. I will not give anything further in the area of transition years until I get firm commitments from all of the interested parties that this cannot be tolerated. What is happening in some schools in the transition year is a travesty. They are breaking the whole spirit and thrust of what was intended to be. I have the names of the schools and I have the details and some very hard talking will have to take place about it. There is no point in what is happening. It is increasing the treadmill if you take a child who has done the intermediate certificate or junior certificate and plunge her straight into an examination process again. That is increasing the pressure on the child and increasing the fear and the worry and the impending doom of examinations. I would appeal to the educational people who are here this evening to look very hard at that, to find out through their vested interests, be it management or unions, the schools in which it is going on. We will be finding it out anyway. We will certainly do something about it. I will not grant any more aid until that is rectified.

I am aware of the need for capitation.

There are about 70 schools that have transition year and it operates within one class. Part of the problem is that there is very little direction in terms of co-ordination——

I will answer that.

Unfortunately there is not——

The Senator will have an opportunity to make his contribution. I would prefer that he would allow the Minister to amplify her remarks.

Be that as it may, when the scheme was set up — and there are much more than 70 now, there are several who have not taken up their option — there were clear guidelines issued that they were not to be in an examination process. There are schools which instead of doing good by having a six year cycle, are increasing the pressure on young peole. We will talk about that again. I have discussed it with the post-primary interests and they do not want this happening.

To assist schools in the junior certificate programme, they were given a special resource grant and we hope to look at that.

In the interests of equity for students from homes where genuine hardship exists, the school books schemes have increased dramatically. Following a period of four years in which the allocation never went up it has gone up by 19 per cent, 23 per cent and 20 per cent year after year. It is never enough but it is a huge improvement.

I thank all the Members who spoke about the education Bill. I thank them for their genuine commitment to that process which will begin with the Green Paper, go onto the White Paper and then the education Bill. Senator Murphy and many other Members as indeed did Members in former Seanaid, have called for consideration of such an Act. Up to now nobody had the audacity perhaps to decide to do something about it.

Intestinal fortitude or bottle.

"Bottle"— lovely: the other sounded vaguely indecent. I hope the genuine response that has been made will be reflected throughout the land.

I am very glad of the opportunity to be here. I wish that perhaps we could structure a framework to deal with education matters each session and work through a series of points in a more precise way. Perhaps it could become nearly like a standing committee on education. It would be very interesting and supportive and also, I feel, conducive to the ongoing debate.

I must end now because there is to be an Adjournment matter relating to my area as well. I want again to explain that the reason I will not be here next Wednesday is that I will be about education business but in a different forum. I am sure my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Frank Fahey, who is most capable and able will take my place.

Acting Chairman

Go raibh míle maith agat, a Aire. Is é an t-am anois a hocht a clog. Iarraim ar an Seanadóir Murphy moladh a dhéanamh chun an díospóireacht seo a chur ar athló.

Le do thoil, is mian liom mo dhea thoil a chur in iúl don Aire. Tá an-mheas agam uirthi mar Aire agus measaim go bhfuil jab fíormhaith á dhéanamh aici. I have nothing to gain by plámás. I want to welcome the Minister and congratulate her on bringing in the education Bill. May she go down in history.

Debate adjourned.

Acting Chairman

I would now like to ask the Acting Leader when it is proposed to sit again?

At 10.30 a.m. tomorrow.

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