Ag an am seo den bhliain, bíonn seans ag gach Seanadóir a thuairimí a nochtadh faoin Rialtas, faoi gach Roinn den Rialtas, faoi pholasaí an Rialtais i ngach ceann de na Ranna sin. Is mór an faoiseamh é sin do na Seanadóirí toisc nach mbíonn an deis labharatha acu faoi mar a bhíonn ag na Teachtaí Dála nuair a thagann gnóthaí éagsúla os a gcomhair sna meastacháin. I mbliana ta suim mhór, uafásach i gceist, os cionn £1,800 milliún. Is ar éigean a fhéadfadh a lán daoine, fiú amháin an suim airgid sin a léamh go cruinn. Is uafásach an méid airgid é. Ba bhaith liom labhairt ar chaitheamh an airgid sin agus ar an fhealsúnacht ba cheart a bheith laistiar de pholasaí an Rialtais agus iad ag leagadh amach na costaisí faoi theidil áirithe anseo is ansúd.
The sum involved is a staggering one of £1,800 million. If time allowed it would be very interesting to speak on all sections of Government expenditure. I shall confine myself to just three or four and I will begin with the one I am most familiar with, namely, education.
Let us take the simple sentence "The master teaches John Latin." There we have what we used to call the double accusative. John is one, Latin is the other. Which of the two is the more important? Latin can cover the subjects taught to pupils and it raises immediately the question, are the right subjects being taught at the right time? There was a time when it was accepted in many educational circles that if you did not teach a boy Latin what was there to teach him? Thinking has changed a lot since. Nowadays we are inclined to think of and develop the ideas of a former educational psychologist when he posed the question of what knowledge is worth the most. I shall come to that point later. We must not alone teach Latin, or any subject, we must teach John. It is around that I have built my thesis—the importance of John in the school which is a family, in his own family, in the family of his parish and in the family of his country, and in the whole human family. I am afraid John is having it tough at the present time especially since the phenomenon crept in some years ago of isolating John and Mary when they reach the age of 13. They were to be kept in isolation and in a particular group from 13 to 19 years. The phenomenon of the teenager was unheard of when I was going to school. That was the first notable attempt in modern times to break up the natural family, the local community family or the family of members of a State. That campaign has had disastrous effects as far as peace and harmony and good relationships between all human beings are concerned.
Another phrase crept in also—the generation gap. Again when I and most of us here—with the exception of very young Senators—were growing up we never heard of such a thing as a generation gap. We all grew up in the presence of our parents, uncles, aunts, neighbours, young and old, and we found nothing strange about that. Between the generation gap and the teenage category things began to come in, teenage clothes, teenage rights, teenage fashions and styles and teenage philosophy. Bit by bit the wedge was brought in. The teenagers thought they had to be different, that they had to isolate their parents. Unfortunately that sort of thing seems to have developed. It is one of the biggest problems we have, especially for those of us who are concerned with education at any level. It is posing many grave social and moral questions. I shall come back to that later.
Senator Robinson gave a very interesting discourse yesterday on the problems of youth, of the under-privileged and so on. She mentioned vandalism, corrective methods as far as youths who get into trouble are concerned, family troubles and so on. She dealt very sympathetically with them but she did not suggest what the remedy might be. She disparaged strong-arm methods; and she said, they are simplistic ways of dealing with it and to a large extent, we agree with her. But in the interest of the harmony that should exist between all members of our community, we would want to seek further. We have got to make sure that in our education system, in everything that the State has control over, particularly television, nothing is done to undermine the status of the family, that nothing is done to undermine lawful and rightful authority.
Another manifestation of the malaise that seems to exist at the moment is the other phase that has come in, that everybody should be doing his own thing. I suppose there is a natural tendency to question authority at some stage but I think we have come to the stage when we have to look at this very seriously and see how far we have gone and examine whether we have not gone too far. Some time ago I got the shock of my life to read a columnist in a Sunday paper who stated:
I am a 28-year-old woman. I believe I have an absolute right to decide how I should treat my body; an absolute right as to how I handle my mind.
That appeared on page 11 of the Sunday Independent, 24 April, 1977. All these things are being read by young people. People have more access to reading material now than they ever had before and that doctrine seems to be preached. Nobody has an absolute right to do anything of the kind. We have rights but we have no absolute right. If we all had absolute rights to do this, that and the other the world would be in a state of total chaos. That sort of thinking is an absolute revolt against, say, the Ten Commandments, the basis of our structure in this country, indeed in the civilised world. Those are some of the considerations to be borne in mind when formulating our education system.
I should like to say a few words about the various sections in the Department of Education—primary, post-primary and what is now known as third level. The school should be a happy place. That was foremost in minds of people when they introduced this new curriculum. School was always a happy place if you had the right kind of teacher there in so far as was humanly possible. In earlier days buildings and conditions were very bad. But the most important person in a school at any given time is the teacher; if a teacher is not right then the school cannot be right. I remember a famous educator years ago who said—and it is a motto I always bear in mind—that if you have just nothing more than a log, you do not even have an old schoolhouse, then at one end of the log you have a wise man and at the other you have an apt pupil, and you have a complete university; it is not so much the conditions but rather the quality, philosophy and attitude of the teacher. It is terribly important that we ensure, when training teachers at all levels, that we get the best there is and give them the best possible training.
There have been many complaints made for some years past, whatever the reason, maybe we are turning out too many too fast, that the quality of teachers leaving training colleges is not what it used to be. Particular complaints have been made regarding the standard of their proficiency in our language. I have heard many complaints about young teachers who have a very poor knowledge of our language, with no great desire to impart it. I am told also that much of the fault lies with what is described as a falling standard of Irish amongst entrants to colleges of education. That should be examined because one of the most important subjects there is at primary and all levels is the subject which embraces our language and all that goes with it, its songs, its philosophy, its sean-fhocail.
If we have not got our language then we have not got our identity. We have nothing on which we can fall back. This thought comes to mind immediately—the unifying influence that is our language. Our language, and the things that go with it, music, place names, log ainmneacha, has a great unifying influence. I find that when speaking with many of our brethren in the Six Counties. I have often played music with them and we are in one thought when we are playing together. Many the happy session I have had with musicians from the Six Counties, people of various religions—nobody asks anybody his religion, background or anything else. We played for the sake of the music and they loved it as much as we did. They loved the songs. Indeed a great many of them would love to know the meaning of those songs and place names. May I digress slightly now? Unfortunately, so many of our fellow Irishmen in the Six Counties are hungering for an identity. They are not British, they do not wish to be called British, they wish to be called Irish. They try to pretend there is such a thing as a British culture when, of course, there is no such thing. There is an English culture, a Scottish culture and a strong Welsh culture but no British culture. Those of our brethren in the North, irrespective of class or creed, so often hunger to identify themselves. Very often they try to identify themselves just as Ulster people, the Ulstermen, because they feel that need.
To revert to primary education, I was speaking of the curriculum introduced some years ago. Having examined it very closely I expressed my doubts in many public places. Most of the subjects in the curriculum being introduced then were already in use in progressive schools. I foresaw one danger and, in that respect, unfortunately, my fears were well founded, that there could be a neglect of the basics to which we always refer as the three Rs. There are widespread complaints nowadays of bad spelling, inability to do simple calculations and so on. These will have to be put right. A person must learn to spell if he is to write properly. He must learn his tables if he is to calculate properly or understand what business is all about. If he does not do these things then he cannot possibly go ahead. I believe that has been carried over into post-primary education. Recently a friend of mine, a professor of education at one of our university colleges, told me he had received a letter from a graduate a few days before in which there were some gross mis-spellings. Basic things cannot be interfered with, such as spelling and tables. If you are a musician you must have your scales and sing or play them in tune. There is no other way; otherwise one cannot advance. These things should be concentrated on.
The third point regarding primary education is this: why has there been such a deterioration in text books? By deterioration in text books I mean their subject matter. Books are glossier with better paper and better print, far more expensive, of course, but their content is not what it should be.
When I started in national school— and that was not yesterday or the day before—I remember quite distinctly the type of textbook we had. I am speaking about textbooks in the English language. There was one series called "Nation-building". It included a splendid lesson which went into pages and pages about the farmer trying to eke out an existence, a lazy farmer whose wife was a most industrious woman. It told of the plans she had for improving the place and finally, as is always the case when a man and woman have different views, she won, and they made an economic holding out of their little farm. That was a lesson, if you like, on home economics, good husbandry and so on. It was told in such a simple way that it went home to each and everyone of us.
There was also a lesson on the Shannon scheme. The Shannon scheme was about to start at that time and we took a great interest in it. What scope there would be for a good text nowadays when we have discovered we have mineral resources of our own. I am sure many will remember from school days that we all learned that we had no mineral resources, good, bad, or indifferent. Now all that has changed and there is great scope for good texts at the moment, lessons on industry, our natural resources, our traditions, our potential as a nation right in the middle of a big fishing area, our place in the Economic Community and so on. I would draw the attention of the Minister to the desirability of having a new series of texts dealing in the widest possible way with our own culture, our potential and our resources. Children's textbooks are widely read by parents and the message can very easily be got over to the parents. Another thing that comes to mind is the "Buy Irish" Campaign. We had lessons on those. I have one of these textbooks at home; unfortunately, I have not got it with me but I would like to pass it around to anybody interested. It had the old trademark, "Déanta in Éireann". It is still there. But that was many years ago. It is high time we provided textbooks on the same lines as those for the present generation.
I have spoken of the importance of our own language for its own beauty, for its philosophy, for its sean-fhocail. There we have a mine of philosophy— good, sound philosophy, our attitude to life. Somebody spoke about education earlier and used the word "educated". Some of the most educated people I have met are people who never went beyond third, fourth or fifth standard in national school. They educated themselves, listened to their elders, picked up the wisdom that was handed down and used their own intelligent observation to assess the values of the various things they met with. One of our greatest Ministers for Educations, the late Seán Moylan, addressing a cumann meeting in north Cork many years ago told his audience, in response to a question, that in every household in his area—and the same applied to every part of Ireland—there was the basis for a splendid library in three areas: economics, theology and astrology. For theology there was the penny catechisms, for economics, he said, there was the creamery book and, with a twinkling in his eye he said, in astrology there was Old Moore's Almanac. There was a lot in what he said. He was a keen and observant man himself.
We have many people of refinement, education, good taste, compassion and good sense who never had any formal schooling beyond fourth or fifth class in national school. As a matter of fact very few of those involved in the foundation of the State had any formal education beyond that level.
I shall now deal with post-primary education. The complaint is widespread that boys and girls going to primary schools are not equipped to do the sort of work required of them in a secondary school where certain texts and a well-defined programme is laid down in the various subjects. This brings me back to the new curriculum. It has been said that often the left hand does not know what the right hand is doing, but, at last, I understand that a committee is being set up by the Minister to examine how best to smooth a way for the transition from primary to secondary schooling.
When a boy or girl goes to a post-primary school he or she is usually about 12½, 13 or 13½ years of age. That is a bit young. If I had my way I would still retain the old seventh class that was there when I was going to school. It was a most important class. It has gone out of fashion now, and more is the pity. There are more fashions in education than in any Department of state in any country. At the age of 13½ or 14 years the boy and girl are developing, they are subject to many changes and they come to a most impressionable age. Much of the reading material that is sent around surreptitiously to those children is of an odious kind. These are things that parents will have to be very watchful of. Children nowadays get into groups and there are clubs for boys and girls of various ages. These would require a close watch. There are many newfangled ideas as regards the type of discussions they should have and there are such things as sensitivity training and so on. Sometimes the guidelines for these are written by people whose philosophy and background are entirely different from our own and whose standard of morals, in the widest sense of the word, leaves a lot to be desired.
Would it not be possible to try to make the leaving certificate course a complete course in itself rather than a jumping-off ground towards third-level education? It seems to be accepted now that a person goes to a post-primary school with the sole objective of going to a university or a third-level institution. Is that a good thing? As regards university entrance, is this points system the best possible means of selecting candidates? I am doubtful. In fact, I go so far as to say that it is not. We could have a boy or a girl—to take the discipline of medicine—very interested in healing but because at the time they may be off form or something or other they do not get sufficient points to allow them go into that discipline. They have no earthly hope then of practising medicine which would give them great satisfaction because they felt they were natural healers. If the points system had been in vogue many years ago some of us would not have been treated by the excellent doctors we were lucky enough to have to call upon.
The points system should be examined very closely. Why not have an interview or a series of interviews instead? A lot more can be found out through an interview, if the interviewer is well qualified and knows his business. If he has compassion, sympathy, knowledge and good sense he will select the right person. It is a much safer way than depending solely on a points system. It would be all right to have so many points and have the interview subsequently, but let the interview decide the matter.
The best value is expected from third-level institutions in view of the enormous amount of money invested in them by the State. It costs the State at least £1,500 for the education of a doctor compared to an expenditure of £180 for a child at primary level. The figures are: £180 for primary education, £270 at secondary level, £800 at third level and at least £1,500 for the education of a doctor. That is a lot of money, apart from grants. We should insist that the best value be given for it.
The majority of students come from good homes, they are well-adjusted young men and women but, unfortunately, to judge by the type of agenda we read of at the recent USI Conference in Wexford, they are dealing with matters which we do not expect students to be dealing with. Again, to judge by what appeared in the papers, there did not seem to be any great discussions on the subjects which they are supposed to study at the various colleges. There were other matters in which they seemed to be more interested, matters which would be unheard of some years ago and which are no concern of students at all.
We hear disturbing reports of literature being distributed by students to new students entering university. Whether they be true or not I cannot say. If they are not true, they should be denied; but if they are true they ought to be investigated because any right-thinking person would not see any point in paying taxes to provide money, part of which is used for the dissemination of very questionable literature among students.
I should like to reply to Posts and Telegraphs. Telephones, telephones, telephones. Everybody is coming along and saying "Senator, could you possibly get a telephone for me? I have started a little business and I cannot go on without one". I ask "When did you apply?" and they say "Six months ago". I say "I am sorry, I cannot do anything for you", and that is that. Every effort must be made to expedite the provision of telephones, especially nowadays. With the upsurge in the economy, everybody wants to be up and doing and getting business. A telephone is an absolute essential at the present time. It goes to my heart when some elderly person comes along and says he applied for a telephone. His family is scattered and he is very lonely, living in an isolated place and is afraid of being attacked. Such people ask if I could get them a telephone so that they could get help if need be. Again, I have to tell them that they must wait for another while.
Then there is the question of vandalism. Those Members who were canvassing during the Seanad campaign will remember the number of telephone kiosks they tried before they got one that worked. Vandalism is on the increase the whole time, due to the break-up of family discipline. It seems to be a revolt against what they term the "Establishment". The "Establishment", as far as vandals are concerned, is anything which tries to keep them on the right road.
Television comes under the authority of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. I want to spend some time on the question of television. I am discussing it as a teacher, a parent and as an Irishman. Television is the greatest influence we have come across for centuries. It is the greatest influence in moulding attitudes and public opinion. Since the advent of television, moral standards seem to have fallen, I mean, moral standards in the widest sense. We have revolts against authority, violence, vandalism, immorality in every sense of the word. Pertinent to that is an article which appeared in the Cork Evening Echo of 28 December 1977, quoting the Assistant General Secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters in England, a Mr. Fred Smitheys. It reads:
The "dirt and smut" which has crept into television and the media is making the job of schools almost impossible and turning Britain into a "perverted" society, a teachers' leader warned today.
We are having to cope with the effects of increases in the numbers of one-parent families, the difficulties caused by easier divorces and separations, and an increase in the number of unmarried mothers.
I will not read the whole article but I have it if anybody wishes to see it. As in many other areas, we are inclined to imitate the British and the Americans. There has been an alarming increase in recent years in the number of picture houses showing what are very often referred to as "blue" films. How they pass the censor I do not know. If there are people who wish to see these things they can go and see them. That is fair enough, but what I object to and what thousands of other people who have spoken to me object to is the bringing of films of that type into our sittingrooms. I object to having fornication scenes brought into my own sittingroom while I am sitting there with my family and friends. What is even worse is that in many of the films we have seen recently on Telefís Éireann the hero and heroine are as often as not either libertines or glorified prostitutes. In a film recently called "The Moneychangers" the last scene in the final episode was the hero arranging with the heroine that they live together, despite criticism and the fact that his wife was a patient in a hospital at the time. Then the scene was faded out. Things like that leave a dreadful impression on minds, particularly of the young. That is undermining our society. I said at the beginning that my theme would be the inviolability and the sanctity of the family, from the natural family at home to the family of the nation. That sort of thing is undermining our morality and corrupting our minds. I am not exaggerating at all and what I am saying is known to everyone. The Roman Empire fell not because of want of legions but because of the corruption that set in throughout the whole empire. These are the things that bring down empires. People cannot concentrate on an economic recovery and the raising of our standards if their minds are corrupted by the things I have spoken of.
I should like to say something more about Radio Telefís Éireann. We want to see more healthy home-made programmes. Games are well catered for but we want more programmes like "Trom agus Eadrom". We want more of our own artistes and we have splendid artistes, musicians and vocalists. They are as good, if not better, than one would get in most countries comparable in size to ours. We have a natural instinct for music, speech and drama, but let us have clean drama. Filth and smut are not drama. We do not want that sort of thing in our homes. People will say, by way of an excuse for these things, that that is reality, it is life. A heap of farmyard manure is also reality but no one would suggest bringing it in by bucketfuls into our sittingrooms. We should be careful of these things and especially now that we are expecting to have RTE 2. I hope they will give a broad spectrum of programmes in our own language. We have not near enough programmes in the Irish language. People are asking for them; they want them. We have some interesting programmes but we want more of them.
Finally, before I leave television and radio, why do we have so many mispronunciations of names and phrases in our own language. I hate to have to say this—I know people will be saying that is the schoolmaster again—but it has to be said. I notice very often the people who make these glaring errors are very careful, if they have a French phrase to offer, to have their pronunciation correct. They seem to gloss over names of Irish firms, even names of political parties. I have heard names of political parties getting a frightful battering from some of these reporters. There is no excuse for that in 1978.
I should now like to say something about the furore that took place recently when the Taoiseach made a statement on a Sunday afternoon programme, "This Week". What he did was to reiterate what has been said thousands of times already, and what is generally accepted by the vast majority of the people of the State, and by every Irishman outside the State. I do not think there is any doubt about that. I can say that the same obtains with our friends on the other side of the House. Basically, everybody is in agreement with that, but still the furore was kicked up. The big bass drum was walloped very hard in the Six Counties and by a certain number down here. It reminded me of the verse of the song: "each of them making the most of his chance, altogether in the shoneens dance". I do not know what all the furore was about.
I do not think anybody referred much to the Six Counties' problem, except Senator Murphy earlier. It is not Ulster I am talking about, it is the Six Counties. Sometimes we hear people, even in our own State, refer to the Ulster problem. It is the Six Counties' problem and it should be stated that way and no other way. There are so many imponderables there. I can speak freely on this because my own people have been in this country only about 200 years. They came here from Britain, originally from Normandy. They came Protestant English and in due course they lived among the people. At least I can say I am as Irish as anybody else in this House. The very opposite occurred when these plantations took place 370 or 380 years ago in the time of James I. Thousands of people were brought in and were not allowed to mix with the people, inter-marry and become one with them, mould their opinions and have their own opinions moulded also and become one unit. In other words instead of allowing them to integrate, steps were taken to make sure that that would not happen by the promotion of bigotry in its most diabolical form. Certainly we had the worst type of bigots, from Cooke down to Paisley, down through the years. That is an unnatural thing and that sort of intransigent, Unionist-thinking is absolutely unnatural. I do not know of anywhere in the world where we have even a parallel for it. I do not think we have anything like it in the pages of history. It is an enormous question.
Then we have our own national element in the North of Ireland. Their character has been twisted and turned, also as a result of being stamped on down through the centuries. There is no doubt that it is still a question of "croppies lie down" up there. The recent survey showed that beyond all doubt—the case of unemployment. The way the Catholic minority are being treated there cries for redress. When all else fails they have to turn to force. That is the position.
In my opinion we can do two things. Fianna Fáil are doing them to the best of their ability; so is every Irishman worthy of the name. We should try to make friends with as many as possible in the Six Counties, irrespective of their class or creed. Let them see that nobody is suggesting that changes will occur, except with the consent of the majority. That has been stated loudly and clearly, but no matter how loudly and clearly it is said it is still no use. We had a number of bishops the other day asking for that very thing which has already been spoken of. It seems incomprehensible. There is this constant air of suspicion and doubt. Let us all rejoice in the common name of Irishmen. The key to all this could be if Britain could realise, as so many Englishmen privately realise, how much it would be to their advantage to encourage unity. Then the Northerners—I mean the intransigent Unionists—would see that there is no future for them in their present state. If they are willing to do something about putting aside their intransigence, the time will come when we may talk about a new Constitution or a simplification of the Constitution. There is nothing to prevent a discussion on a Federal Parliament up there. All these things can be discussed. The easiest way Britain could do this would be to say "We hope to pull out after so many years and when we do pull out the money we are investing in Northern Ireland at present will be taken away too." I read somewhere that the cost to the British taxpayer for the Six Counties for 1977 was something in the region of £600 or £700 million. That is a staggering figure. These are very big questions.
