Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 20 October 2009
108 Deputy Brian Hayes asked the Minister for Education and Science the discussions he has had to date in 2009 with the Protestant community regarding decisions taken in budget 2009 to reduce funding to voluntary Protestant schools; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [37329/09]
View answerMy colleagues in Government and I recognise the importance of ensuring that students from a Protestant background can attend a school that reflects their denominational ethos. I have met representatives of the Church of Ireland, the Grand Orange Lodge and a rural Protestant fee-paying school. I will meet representatives of the Protestant education sector tomorrow.
The representations I have received have focused on two aspects of the budget changes. First was the allocation of teachers to all fee-charging schools. By making the changes to the pupil-teacher ratio, the Government recognised that such schools, regardless of religious ethos, have extra income which they can use and have used to employ additional teachers. If I had not made this change, I would have been faced with making a more severe change to the staffing position of all schools. I believe the measures that differentiated between those schools with fee income and those without were fairer all round. The case being put to me is that this change should not apply to Protestant fee-charging schools.
The second aspect is the withdrawal of certain grants that had been paid to Protestant fee-charging schools that were not paid to Catholic fee-charging schools. The argument being put to me is that the grants should be restored. I have emphasised that the Government decided to continue to provide the block grant, which was increased this year. It is targeted as a support to individual pupils to enable them to attend Protestant schools.
Article 44 of the Constitution permits State aid to denominational schools, but only on the basis that there be no discrimination between schools under different religious management. The advice of the Attorney General has been provided on the interpretation of this provision and I am satisfied that the budget changes are consistent with the Constitution.
From the discussions I have had, I am aware that the funding position of Protestant fee-charging schools in many areas may be more difficult than the position of Protestant fee-charging schools in Dublin. I have consistently said I am willing to consider any proposals that would more effectively focus funding on schools in rural areas. I have still to receive any such proposals. Any proposals and how precisely they are targeted will need to be considered having regard to the constitutional requirement.
Is it not fair to say that the Minister is on a direct collision course with the Protestant faith in this country and that his handling of this issue has been utterly insensitive to Protestant schools and the ethos provided in those schools? When the then Minister for Education, Donogh O'Malley, introduced free post-primary education in the 1960s he did a deal with them. The Minister is breaking that deal and is doing so in the most insensitive way. He is doing it in a way that does not bring people with him and that loses confidence in his position as Minister for Education and Science. The Minister needs to deal with this issue once and for all. He has been putting canards into the public domain that in some way there is legal advice that he had to act upon this. For 40 years their situation was protected within Irish education. Since the budget of last year the Minister is undermining that. He is undermining their confidence in the Government's position in terms of denominational education and the rights of those 21 schools.
Schools will go to the wall, particularly Protestant schools in rural parts of the country unless he shows some flexibility and meets people half way. To date the misinformation he has put out first, that moneys existed in budgets that were not spent and, second, in respect of legal opinion that had never been sought in the past 40 years has resulted in a terrible loss of faith in his position as Minister for Education and Science among the minority community.
I am pleased to inform the Deputy so as to ensure he understands exactly what is happening. I have treated the Protestant bishops and any other group who have met me with the respect and fairness due to them and certainly the equity that was desired. This answer has been cleared by the Attorney General. He believes that to continue the grant that was available would be unconstitutional because it was being given to the Protestant denomination and being refused to the Catholic denomination.
The Deputy accused me of breaking what was an agreement between the then Minister for Education, Donogh O'Malley, and the Protestant churches. I say to him that I am not breaching that agreement.
That is not the issue.
The block grant was agreed between——
That is another canard.
——Donogh O'Malley and the Protestant churches. That block grant continues to this day. It is important that I further advise the Deputy that the grant that is made available to the Protestant schools amounts to €645 per pupil. The grant available to ordinary second level schools is €345. They are in a more privileged position.
There is a reason for it.
The Deputy has accused me of putting out misinformation. When I took away this grant, the Protestant bishops agreed with me that they had €2 million in the education committee's coffers that was not spent and that was derived from this grant. In the interim period I asked them to use that money to defray any difficulties that exist and come back to me with a scheme that would look at the Dublin and general urban situation where money is more freely available to families with a view to targeting together those rural schools that are experiencing problems. That was last November and we are now in October, and I am still waiting for the Protestant community to come back with its observations.
The Minister has a difficulty in reading the newspapers and in communicating with these people. If he is in constant communication with them, is he not aware that the Church of Ireland, the Methodist community in Ireland and the Presbyterian Church have publicly asked him to reverse these cuts as late as two weeks as ago? Regarding the Catholic fee-paying schools, the Minister said that he would be discriminating against one church in favour of the other. I suspect he is also unaware of the following point, because he barely understands the detail of this. When representatives of the sector appeared before the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Education and Science, those representing the Catholic schools made it clear that they had no difficulty in allowing the 21 Protestant schools continuing to have those grants because they respected the position that had historically come down from the time of the introduction of free education in the 1960s.
The Minister has continually put misinformation in the public domain about this issue, which has not been helped by his less than sensitive remarks today. I suggest that he needs to get this right. He is on a collision course that has considerable implications across the island, North and South. Before he goes down the route of seeking confrontation he should think again.
Does the Deputy want a Minister to allow an issue that is not constitutional to continue?
The Deputy is not allowed to answer questions.
I am not prepared to allowed to allow something that is contrary to the Constitution——
What about all the Minister's predecessors?
Allow the Minister to continue.
If I get that advice from the current Attorney General on that basis, then I cannot——
What about all the Minister's predecessors?
Allow the Minister to answer questions.
The Deputy should not ask me to do that. I refer the Deputy back to an occasion when the then Minister, Deputy Martin, was challenged by the Deputy's party on an issue in the health sector. Those in the Deputy's party asked him how long he knew that an issue was unconstitutional before he acted. Is that what the Deputy wants me to do? Does he want me to act as a Minister in an unconstitutional way?
It is a cutback.
I am not prepared to do that for anyone. I am very conscious of the difficulties that pertain to rural Protestant schools. I have pointed out to the Protestant clergy that I am prepared to talk to them and to target and focus. I want them to come back with their suggestions as to how that focus can be properly assigned.
