I thank the Ceann Comhairle for selecting the matter for discussion, and the Minister of State for taking it.
The resources available at primary level education are totally inadequate. The great partnership of parents, managers and teachers are together requesting the Minister to respond in a positive way to their assertion that the capitation grant, currently £50 per pupil, is totally inadequate given present day costs, to finance the day-to-day running of their schools, for the provision of heating, lighting, insurance and so on. Their demand, which is reasonable, is for an immediate doubling of the amount from £50 to £100 to partially close the gap that exists between primary and second level capitation grants, a gap which now stands at £127 per pupil. This differential is unacceptable and unjustified. The funding of education here is like an inverted pyramid with the greatest amount of funding going to third level education, less to second level education and least of all to primary education. This a poor foundation for an important and vital stage in a child's education. The area of greatest need is the area where least resources are being targeted, resulting in obvious areas of neglect.
Parents have to raise funds to provide basic requirements for their schools. A £5 per pupil increase in the grant last year was not sufficient to provide paper for infants to scribble on. Is it right that local parents' groups and teachers must take direct action to support their children's education? This is not what was promised in the Programme for Government.
The most vulnerable students lose out at primary level and can never regain a place within the ordinary cycle. Is it any wonder that there are approximately 36,000 pupils with severe reading and learning difficulties and as many more with moderate difficulties? At least one in three needs remedial teaching and is not receiving it. The Minister has failed to respond through the appointment of remedial and resource teachers to schools which clearly need them. No wonder Ireland ranks fourth from the bottom in the OECD with regard to the reading levels of children who have left primary school. That is some record.
Is this the priority the Government declared when it came into office? No additional teachers were appointed to the primary sector since it came to office and its efforts to use the panel system to transfer teachers is an indication of its lack of response to the real needs at primary level. On several occasions in the past year I have sought the appointment of 27 remedial and resource teachers to schools in need in east Galway. The Minister's response was to make four appointments, not one of which was an additional appointment.
Class sizes are deteriorating again. How can the Minister at a time of buoyant financial and economic progress fail to divert some of these resources into the primary sector? I seek an immediate response or an indication that, in the forthcoming budget, the Minister will provide for a hundred fold increase in the capitation grant and that remedial and resource facilities will be made available to those in greatest need.
