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Seanad Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 7 Jul 2015

Vol. 241 No. 4

Commencement Matters

Teaching Qualifications

Is trua nach bhfuil an tAire Oideachais agus Scileanna anseo ach cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit ag an Roinn Ealaíon, Oidhreachta agus Gaeltachta, Deputy Joe McHugh. I tabled this matter to ask the Minister for Education and Skills to facilitate the continuation of restricted recognition for graduates in Montessori education, as currently permitted under regulation 3 of the Teaching Council Acts. This affects approximately 100 graduates per year between St. Nicholas Montessori College and Cork Institute of Technology. As the regulation has been in place since 2005, up to 1,000 of these graduates have level 8 degrees. Graduates with level 8 qualifications in Montessori education are currently afforded restricted recognition. They may be appointed to teaching positions in special education settings in primary schools and special schools. The numbers registering under this provision amount to 1% of annual registrants, or approximately 110 teachers.

If the proposed removal of regulation 3 is allowed they will not be able to secure any form of recognition from the Teaching Council because in the absence of a Teaching Council registration number, a graduate with a four-year, level 8 degree cannot be appointed to a primary school or a special school. These graduates are in the Minister of State's county of Donegal as well as my county of Galway. The Department of Education and Skills will not pay any person in a teaching capacity who does not have a Teaching Council registration number. I understand the Teaching Council is advising the Minister to sign an order that will withdraw registration for these Montessori teaching graduates.

If the proposed removal of regulation 3 is allowed, the only current role within the education setting available to level 8 graduates would then be as special needs assistants. There is a big difference between being a teacher and being a special needs assistant in a special school. As the Minister of State knows that is in a particular care setting. The opportunity for Montessori graduates to practise the pedagogical foundations acquired under the four years of higher education could not then be exercised. It is an appalling vista for people who have invested in a four-year degree. Furthermore, it is a downgrading of early years education and the Minister should not do this.

Graduates and providers of level 8 Montessori programmes are seeking the retention of the existing registration process. In other words they want it left alone. The Montessori pedagogy is recognised as having a unique role in assisting children with special needs. The 141 special schools would bear the brunt of this decision if it proceeds, which is fairly serious. The children would lose access to teaching resources, human resources with a set of skills designed to assist their personal and educational development.

I recently met a qualified second level teacher who has Teaching Council registration. However, it was her Montessori qualification that gave her an opportunity to get a particular role working with three children with extreme needs.

Research by Banks et al. in 2014 suggests that up to 25% of children in the educational system have special educational needs. While the spectrum of the resources to address their needs will vary, statistics available from the NCSE and the Department of Education and Skills confirm that over recent years the allocation of resources has increased by an average of 6.5% annually. Importantly there has been no evidence that the low-entry requirement, which is often cited as a basis for differentiation for Montessori graduates, has impacted on the quality of the provision for pupils with special educational needs - if anything it has improved them.

The Minister has made a very strong commitment to the early years sector, which has been backed up by very positive action. Montessori graduates want to play their part in helping the Minister to realise her vision. However, if the Teaching Council proposal is allowed to proceed in its current format, it will send a message to those teachers and educators in early years settings that they are not part of the education profession. Rather than building on her initiative it will detract and demotivate the very persons we rely on for the continuum of education from birth to six years and into the special needs sector as well.

Knowing the Minister's commitment to early years education, the Minister should not be the Minister to sign off on this regulation. The required amendments allow for the implementation of Part 5 of the Teaching Council Acts 2001 to 2012 to proceed without abolishing the current provision under regulation 3. I accept the role of the Teaching Council inter alia is to provide advice and guidance to the Minister, but in this instance the Minister has the authority to reject this. I am asking the Minister of State to convey this concern to the Minister for Education and Skills so that the qualifications and standing of our Montessori teachers, who have restricted access and restricted recognition to teach in our primary schools in special education and the early years setting, are not affected.

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Seanadóir. Tá mé thar a bheith sásta bheith ar ais sa Seanad arís.

Go raibh maith agat as an gcuireadh bheith anseo. Dúirt an Seanadóir Healy Eames go bhfuil brón uirthi nach bhfuil Aire sinsearach, an Teachta Jan O'Sullivan, i láthair. Ba mhaith liom a rá go bhfuil caidreamh maith idir mo Roinn agus an Roinn Oideachais agus Scileanna i dtaobh an tumoideachais atá ar siúl idir an chéad agus an dara bliain. Tá comhairliúchán cuimsitheach ar siúl fosta.

Déanfaidh mé mo dhícheall scairt a chur agus an t-eolas a sheoladh chuig an Aire sinsearach inniu. Ba mhaith liom mo mhíle buíochas a ghabháil leis an Seanadóir arís.

I thank the Senator for raising this issue and I welcome the opportunity to address the Seanad on the topic. As the Senator may be aware, the Teaching Council is the independent statutory regulator for the teaching profession. The council sets standards for all elements of the continuum of teacher education including initial teacher education programmes, induction and continuous professional development.

The Teaching Council's regulations for the registration of teachers were first published in 2009 and set out the standards that teachers must meet if they wish to be registered members of the profession in Ireland.

Regulation 3, covering special educational needs and Montessori, was put in place in accordance with the relevant circulars issued by the Department prior to the council's establishment in 2006, whereby such teachers are eligible for employment in restricted school settings, that is, in certain categories of special schools and in certain classes in mainstream schools where Irish is not a curricular requirement.

The council has been engaged in a review of the regulations for some time, and has consulted with a number of stakeholders, including a provider of Montessori teacher education. The review has been necessitated by the extension and reconceptualisation of all programmes of initial teacher education. New regulations will also be necessary in light of the Bill to amend the Teaching Council Acts that is currently completing its passage through the Houses.

The developments are part of a significant programme of reform of teacher education in which the council has been engaged in recent years, informed in part by the Department's literacy and numeracy strategy of 2011. It is important to remember that the primary focus of the reform programme is to enhance the quality of teaching and learning experience for all children and young people. In any discussions we have about teaching and learning, including inclusive education, the learner must be the focus.

As the statutory professional standards body for teaching in Ireland, the Teaching Council is of the view that all teachers should be first and foremost qualified and registered as teachers in their given sector whether primary or post-primary, before they specialise in particular areas of teaching and learning. Special education needs, SEN, is now mandatory in all programmes of initial teacher education under the council's criteria and guidelines, so the landscape has evolved significantly since regulation 3 was put in place.

That said, the council itself acknowledges that no one phase of teachers' learning will be sufficient to address all the needs of the pupils they will teach throughout their careers. The very concepts of continuous professional development, CPD, and the draft national framework for teachers' learning, Cosán, bear that out. Specialist provision will continue to have its place in teachers' learning. Once teachers are fully qualified and registered, it is hoped they will continue to have a keen interest in finding quality programmes that will enable and empower them to adapt their practice to the needs of children in their care.

Recent changes in the teacher education landscape have been designed to ensure that inclusive education, incorporating the education of learners with special education needs, is given the appropriate professional space and time. In summary, the advice of the council that regulation 3 is no longer required has been accepted. I thank the Senator for raising this important matter.

I would be very disappointed if the Minister were to sign the regulation. I urge her not to do so. I accept that the Teaching Council is very busy. At times, I am in close contact with the Teaching Council and it has said it has no interest in early years graduates. It does not acknowledge the very specific pedagogy that Maria Montessori afforded us all, and that has informed teacher education formation for all. What impresses me about Montessori graduates is that they have very specific hands-on knowledge of how to work with children in special educational needs settings. I was a teacher educator and I know how squashed the programmes are.

While I am pleased that special needs education is a part of all programmes, I do not believe any current teacher education programme has an adequate focus on special education and the range and complexity of needs facing teachers in the classroom. I urge the Minister to consider the matter again. I appreciate that it is not the Minister of State's brief. Thank you very much, a Chathaoirligh, for the time. Does the Minister of State agree with the two-tier approach that is emerging between the 1,000 graduates that have gone through the system that had restricted recognition afforded to them and the new students who are in the system who will not be given any? Another form of discrimination is emerging. Does the Minister of State agree with that?

The important focus of the response is to put pupils at the centre of the process.

That is what I am saying.

Every teacher embraces that philosophy. Senator Healy Eames is a former teacher and I am a former secondary schoolteacher. I worked in St. Mark's in Tallaght in 1992 and in the Loreto school in Letterkenny in 1993. The situation has changed dramatically since then. The focus is more pupil-centred. I accept there are challenges, especially in terms of the experience of Montessori teachers and the valuable input they have.

My job today is to take back the Senator's message to the Minister and I certainly will do that.

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire Stáit.

Government Economic and Evaluation Service

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. I have tabled this matter because the work of the Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service is most valuable. It is an essential part of the work being done by the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, and the Minister of State at the Department of Finance, Deputy Harris. It is the expenditure equivalent of the work the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council does on the tax side. It is vital that public money is not spent on expenditures that are ineffective and that do not create a flow of benefits that exceed the costs and it is not desirable to have expenditures which add to the national debt problem. The Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service has a seven-member oversight committee and I commend them. They include Professors Dave Madden and Kevin Denny of UCD, as well as Professor Frances Ruane. The chair is Ms Deirdre Hanlon, assistant secretary at the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. There also is a 15-member management group. They have a strong view that the service needs to extend its work to include the Departments of Education and Skills and Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and they want those Departments to join in the Government Economic and Evaluation Service by the end of 2015. I would say, "Why not today?" That is approximately €9 billion of expenditure, out of €53 billion overall or 18%, that is not covered by this valuable work that we all must do. The first set of graduates recruited will have joined by the first quarter of this year. They have masters degrees and the object is a programme of continuous professional development to assist both the Government and the Oireachtas in providing an evaluation service.

The constitutional officer to oversee value for money is the Comptroller and Auditor General and perhaps this new body should liaise with him because sometimes the Comptroller and Auditor General only turns up after the mishap has happened. Members need to have early warnings, as events such as the banking crisis illustrate for them. Moreover, there are parallels, such as the Congressional Budget Office in the United States and so on. The problem with this evaluation exercise is it undoubtedly will have powerful enemies. Lobby groups, not just bankers, think they have the right to Exchequer funds, notoriously on 29 September 2008. There are also enemies within as described in the work of the US economist, William Niskanen, whereby in many bureaucracies, promotion depends on expanding the budget and therefore, they maximise the budget rather than even asking the question as to whether those budgets led to any useful outputs. More cost-benefit analyses and more studies are needed in advance.

There have been three cases of late about which I am worried. A single page was all that appeared in the Oireachtas Library about the sale of Aer Lingus. While I expressed strong views on the other point of view regarding the sale of the Government's stake, this is inadequate. In addition, I raised at the relevant Oireachtas committee last week the issue of postcodes, involving €27 million for a seven-digit non-sequential address for every house in the country but I note the time the President had to consider such a proposal, on which I have seen no cost-benefit analysis, was reduced when the Government invoked Article 25.2 2° of the Constitution to require that legislation to be signed on a date earlier than the fifth day after the Bill was presented to the President.

The third case that has arisen in the transport committee, which I believe also affects the Minister of State's part of the country and it concerns the question of whether it is the correct solution to generate electricity for Northern Ireland within that territory, for example, in Derry or in Larne or is it correct to generate it in the South? How much does one lose if the transmission is overhead on pylons or underground? I believe that numbers in this regard would help.

This is a message that is of use to evaluation. We should have a lot more of it as it is valuable and this House will always support progress towards better evaluation of public expenditure. All knowledge that can help the better governance of Ireland should be promoted. Moves in that regard certainly would have the support of this House. This is why I asked for this item to be considered. The initiative is important, will have powerful enemies and people will try to avoid it but it is in the interests of Parliament and, as the Government has stated, it is in its own interest to have full evaluations and full discussion. The recruitment of all these young people with those qualifications and the involvement of the senior academics is most welcome and I wish the initiative well.

Ar dtús, ba mhaith liom aitheantas a thabhairt don Seanadóir as ucht an Ghaeilge a úsáid ar dtús fosta. Gabhaim míle buíochas leis. I thank Senator Barrett for raising this issue, which I am taking on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, who is not available this afternoon due to Government business.

The Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service, IGEES, was established in 2012. The introduction of the new service was part of the broader expenditure reform agenda launched by the Minister, Deputy Howlin. It is an integrated cross-Government service to enhance the role of economics and value-for-money analysis in policy making and demonstrates a strong commitment to a high and consistent standard of policy evaluation and policy analysis throughout the Civil Service. The purpose of IGEES is to enhance the evaluation and economic capacity of the Civil Service. Its first objective is to develop a professional service that will provide good quality analysis to assist Government, its second objective is that it aims to support better policy design and its third objective is that it works towards more open policy dialogue with expert stakeholders.

IGEES is spread across the central government sector. It operates within a large number of Government Departments, each of which has specific units or sections that are focused on economic and/or evaluation work. In some Departments, evaluation or economic units were already in place prior to the establishment of IGEES. These have typically either been expanded or are planned to be expanded as part of developing the new service. In other Departments, new units have been set up. Building on existing specialised expertise in Government Departments, there have already been three successful recruitment campaigns since 2012 to augment this capacity. There will also be annual recruitment campaigns to sustain and develop the service. These intakes of qualified economists and evaluators will help ensure the service meets its long-term objectives. There are now approximately 90 IGEES members working across the Civil Service.

IGEES members work on core areas of government, including the budget and macroeconomic forecasting. IGEES members developed the public spending code - the value-for-money standards for public expenditure - and are actively involved in promoting the code. IGEES units in Departments across the Civil Service are already delivering a range of analytical and statistical outputs. The entire range of different analyses is published by individual Departments and also on the IGEES website at http://igees.gov.ie. These analyses include: programme evaluations: cross-cutting reviews: economic analysis: tax expenditure reviews; and sectoral trend analysis. Some examples of recently published papers include: A Strategic Framework for Investment in Land Transport - Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport; A Fact Sheet on Irish Agriculture - Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine; Behavioural Economics - Department of Public Expenditure and Reform; Expenditure Implications of Demographic Change in the Primary and Post-Primary Sectors - Department of Public Expenditure and Reform.

Departments which are involved in IGEES follow shared approaches to recruitment, promotion and mobility for their IGEES staff. Under the leadership of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, they have also jointly developed a standardised professional development framework and a strong programme of training and development opportunities. In addition, the IGEES network and annual conference provide important opportunities for members to present and discuss their work with colleagues from other Government Departments, as well as academics and specialists.

IGEES is particularly important to support programme evaluation across the Civil Service. The growing capacity of IGEES will play a central role in delivering a new series of expenditure evaluations under the value-for-money review initiative as the previous round comes to a close. The initiative is a long-standing feature of the evaluation landscape in Ireland. It requires Departments to systematically examine and review spending programmes to ensure that they are working efficiently and effectively. The overall objective of the reviews is to inform spending decisions. Value-for-money reviews are regularly published by Departments and laid before the Oireachtas. During the next three years, a new programme of reviews covering well over 30 different programme areas will be carried out. The results of these reviews will help underpin the next comprehensive review of expenditure.

The recent such review built on the work of IGEES staff across Departments and in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. A range of background analyses and papers that were undertaken by IGEES as part of that review were published. The output of IGEES is available to inform policy makers, public debate and Parliament. The Minister, Deputy Howlin, introduced the whole-of-year budgetary process so that the Oireachtas could engage in constructive dialogue with Ministers and their officials about spending plans and priorities. To do this, it is important that the Oireachtas has timely, coherent and relevant information. A significant volume of information has been made available to committees through the performance budgeting initiative.

In addition, the range of evaluations undertaken and published by Departments, often using their IGEES resources, provides further evidence to help the Oireachtas assess public policy options.

I thank the Minister of State for his comprehensive and wide-ranging reply. The open policy dialogue he mentioned is a credit to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform and his Department. It is also vitally necessary that it is not in any way subverted by people with favourite projects who try to get them through without evaluation. It is more welcome that the skills deficits noted in the Wright report are being addressed. I hope these new evaluation experts will be fully incorporated into the public service. It is the kind of expertise we need and it is part of the reforms we all came into the House in 2011 to implement. It is good to hear about the progress that is being made. The Minister will have support for that momentum on this side of the House. It is important and valuable work and this House will not be found wanting because it is essential that we never drift back to where we were between 2005 and 2008. It is important that every item of public expenditure is fully accounted for and value for money is assured to taxpayers.

It is important to keep this conversation going but I would like to acknowledge that every Department has bought into, and is contributing to, this process and there is an input. We always have to be conscious that it is a three-way conversation between the citizens, the Legislature and the experts. When I was a Member of this House in 2005, I quoted my father who said: "If we do not watch what is going on this country whereby people are paying up to €600,000 for two-bedroom apartments, they will have millstones around their necks for the rest of their lives." We have to be conscious of the fact that this House has a role and there should be better trigger mechanisms. We have a second arm of the Legislature here and there should be trigger mechanisms when a politician raises a point in this House in order that it is followed through. I recall making that point at the time and that was as far as it went. I appreciate the Senator's contribution. I am a big advocate of the man on the street and he was talking about a property bubble bursting and crashing long before it became trendy within the appropriate field of expertise.

Eurozone Issues

I welcome the Minister of State and I am glad he is an advocate of the man and woman on the street and his or her views. I wonder what are the views of the man on the street in Athens today following Sunday's referendum. I debated this matter with the Minister of State at the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Harris, in the House last week, and while neither of us put our political prediction hats on, both of us deep down suspected that the Greek people would see fit to come round to the conventional world view of Greece and vote "Yes", but they surprised us and much of the EU and took a democratic decision to vote "No". It is not a decision we may have desired but that was the result of the referendum. As we speak, much bigger and more serious and senior discussions are taking place elsewhere between eurozone finance Ministers and eurozone leaders and, hopefully, during the next few hours and days, a solution will be put together to allow Greece to remain in the eurozone and to allow the ongoing work of the European project to continue. It would be a complete and utter economic and political disaster for the eurozone and the EU itself if Greece was forced out of the eurozone.

I would be the first to concede that the management of the Greek economy by previous Greek Governments left much to be desired. The current Greek Government, having been swept to power on a wave of euphoria, dreams and promises a few months ago, has also taken unhelpful economic action. Hopefully however, arising from what it believes to be a mandate from its referendum on Sunday, it might see common sense.

The Irish Government and other governments in the eurozone, as well as in the broader European Union, must be seen to work with and for a Greek solution. It may be necessary to swallow some political pride. We all know the reality of the politics of the situation. Certain countries do not want to see a win for Syriza. As a political "saddo" who watches all parties’ Ard-Fheiseanna, I was not impressed to see the now Greek finance Minister speak at the Sinn Féin Ard-Fheis several months ago, highlighting the links and similarities between Sinn Féin’s and Syriza's policies. That is politics but we must move beyond this to ensure the misery faced by the people of Greece is dealt with.

Wild promises continued to be made right up until the last moment of the referendum campaign. The outgoing finance Minister said that, regardless of the referendum result, the Greek banks would be open on the following Monday and Tuesday and a solution found within 48 hours. Again, that was being overly optimistic. It is essential, however, we park the politics and look at the bigger picture to devise a workable solution.

From an Irish perspective, rather than following we should be leading. There was a time when Irish foreign policy had a strong moral dimension to it. It was one in which Ireland felt obliged, because of our colonial history, to side with the underdog, forming alliances with smaller nations. It appears now, however, that in the European Union, and in particular the eurozone, we take our leads not from the smaller countries but the more powerful. We need to work with all of our colleagues on the European stage, large and small.

Not only is there an opportunity but there is an obligation on us to be one of the countries advocating for concessions towards Greece. The Minister of State can argue about the cost to Ireland. However, what will be the cost to Ireland if Greece does exit the eurozone? What is the cost if it has a contagion effect on our nearest neighbour, the UK, and impacts on its forthcoming European referendum? We must not just be thinking in the political short term but look towards the medium and long-term necessity of keeping the eurozone strong.

I appreciate there are evolving negotiations taking place on the whole issue. What is the Government’s current thinking on the matter?

I thank Senator Bradford for putting down this matter, which is evolving as we speak. He has given a broad and holistic view on this important issue.

Greece remains a full member of the euro area and it is in all our interests that it remains so. However, as the Government has stated on many occasions, as a member of the euro area, each member state has responsibilities and obligations. This is no different for Greece.

The referendum in Greece on Sunday, 5 July resulted in a majority “No” vote, which was a rejection of the prior action list as it stood on 25 June. It should be noted this list was not a final list as the Greek authorities unilaterally withdrew from negotiations before agreement could be reached.

While there were still divergences, there was considerable commonality to bridge the gap and agree a single document that all parties could sign up to. The institutions had come forward with a very favourable offer to Greece and would have also addressed future financing needs and the sustainability of the Greek debt, although this had not been discussed or agreed by the Eurogroup. It also included support for a Commission-led package for a new start for jobs and growth and would boost recovery of investment in the real economy. Greece withdrew from the negotiations and called a referendum. As of midnight on 30 June, the second economic adjustment programme for Greece expired along with associated disbursements. Therefore any further financing for Greece would likely be under a new programme with associated conditionality.

Today, the finance Ministers of the euro area will meet to take stock of developments, listen to the new Greek finance Minister and try to find a way forward. This will be followed by a meeting of the Heads of State and Government of the euro area, the euro summit, in which the Taoiseach will participate. The ball is now in the Greek court.

For recovery of the Greek economy to occur, difficult measures and reforms are inevitable. There is no getting away from this. It is important that the Greek authorities put forward reform measures that will put the Greek economy back on a sustainable path. Ireland is, of course, open to a new programme for Greece, but any programme must be backed by a full memorandum of understanding and a commitment to strong ownership and implementation. Time is running out, as is evident from the extremely difficult situation the Greek banks are facing.

While the governing council of the ECB maintained the level of emergency liquidity assistance, ELA, at just under €90 billion, it decided to adjust the haircuts on collateral accepted by the bank. We have great sympathy for the Greek people and the Minister for Finance has expressed this view on several occasions. He has also been quite helpful to the Greek authorities in moving to the position whereby realistic negotiations were taking place prior to the referendum and stands ready to further these efforts with the new finance Minister.

Ireland, together with the other member states, understands and empathises with the difficult situation faced by the Greek people which has been exacerbated by the expiry of the second programme and the current uncertainty created by the referendum. This is why there is still a willingness to negotiate a way forward which takes account of the realities of the situation in Greece and the political priorities of its new Government. We have engaged as quickly as possible. It is now up to the Greek authorities to come up with a credible plan which will undo the damage created by this uncertainty and put Greece on a sustainable path of growth.

I sincerely wish the Taoiseach and the Minister for Finance well today in their onerous responsibilities. The Minister of State said that the ball is now in the Greek court. The ball is in the courts of all the eurozone countries and with their leaders. We know from our history, and for geographical reasons the Minister of State knows this better than I, that when big decisions must be made and compromises found, movement is required on both sides and previously entrenched views and positions must be set aside. That is why saying the ball is in the Greek court is not sufficient. There must be movement, compromise and new, fresh thinking on all our parts if a solution is to be found. I hope Ireland is leading the charge in seeking those compromises and that new thinking.

Language is open to interpretation. I have been learning Irish in the past year. There is an old Irish saying that is valid in this debate, ní neart go cur le chéile, there is no strength without unity. We want Greece to be part of the eurozone and we want that strength in unity. When we are using language, we should go back to our first language and maybe we are better at articulating the Irish language - ní neart go cur le chéile. I hope a resolution is found and that there is a meeting of minds on all sides to try to forge some way of moving this major difficulty out of the space it is in.

Sitting suspended at 3.15 p.m. and resumed at 3.30 p.m.
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