Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 17 September 2014
1418. Deputy Michael McCarthy asked the Minister for Education and Skills the oversight her Department provides to ensure unemployed and newly qualified teachers are prioritised for temporary or permanent teaching positions; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [34452/14]
View answerThe redeployment arrangements is the first method used to fill vacancies in the school system. The core function of the redeployment arrangements is to facilitate the redeployment of all surplus permanent teachers to other schools that have vacancies. The redeployment of all surplus permanent teachers is key to the Department's ability to manage within its payroll budget and ceiling on teacher numbers. Thereafter, primary schools are required under the panel arrangements to fill permanent vacancies from supplementary panels comprised of eligible fixed-term (temporary/substitute) and part-time teachers.
Once the redeployment panels have been cleared, primary schools with permanent vacancies are advised that they can proceed to open competition to fill these vacancies. Temporary posts are filled by open competition which appropriately qualified teachers are eligible to apply for.
The policy of my Department is to ensure, as far as possible, that the managerial authorities of schools give priority to unemployed registered teachers who are fully qualified when filling vacant posts and my Department has issued a number of circulars addressing this issue in recent years. Under these circulars, School Principals must maintain a list of unemployed registered teachers who are available for substitute work at short notice. Circular 31/2011 details a cascade of measures for the recruitment of teachers, prioritising registered teachers over retired registered teachers and unregistered people.
