TUI President Bernie Ruane’s response to Minister’s speech
Wednesday 27th April 2011
Welcome, Minister, to your first TUI Conference as Minister for Education and Skills. The new government has not yet completed one hundred days in office so we will be patient for a while. We hope that when you have clearly established your policies that you will be a Minister for Education that that we in TUI, but more importantly, the people of this country will have good reason to remember.
In my lifetime so far, there are two Ministers for Education that the ordinary citizens of this country remember for their courage in tackling disadvantage in our society. I’m sure you remember them as well. The first was Donogh O’Malley, who changed some people’s lives forever by introducing free second level education in 1967. Indeed, one of those lives he changed was my own. Up until then 17,000 children left school every year after 6th class. Within seven years the numbers attending second level had increased by 25%. He understood that education was an investment in the future. In fact, he made this announcement by taking his courage in his hands at a union conference, if you don’t mind, whilst the Minster for Finance, Jack Lynch was on holidays!
The second big change to Irish education came from Minister for Education Niamh Bhreathnach in the 1990s. This was the abolition of fees for third level education. You yourself were the Minister for Finance at that time. Free fees have given access to third level education to many in our society. Naturally the amount of disadvantaged students going on to third level is not as high as we hoped, but you must take credit for the fact that there are now a huge number of students from lower income families who are attending third level and who could not have been able to do so were it not for the fees initiative. We have now 60% of school leavers participating in third level education. This is a huge leap forward and I must applaud the Rainbow Coalition government of which you were a member for this initiative.
To increase these numbers even further, we need many more initiatives to tackle disadvantage. However, resources are required to do this and I know you are telling us here today that there is no money to invest in education during this recession, but investment in education is, believe me, Minister, the way out of a recession. This is not a new idea. Both Roosevelt and the British Labour Party after World War II made investment in education their priority. In more recent times, the Nordic countries invested heavily in education to get out of their recessions. We would ask you, Minister, to do the same. It might help you greatly if you knew when the Minister for Finance, Michael Noonan, was going on holidays.
Mininster ,the nation was outraged last week to read that the CEO of AIB walked after only one year at the job where his company had losses of 12 BILLION with a handshake of 3million. Minister, it’s obscene. It will be devastating for all of us if this new government does not do something about this . Don't hide behind the cloak of “it did not happen on this governments watch.” How can the contracts of these individuals be untouchable when the contracts of ordinary workers appear not to be worth the paper it is written on .The government had no problem taking money from public sector workers and pensioners but are unwilling to touch the golden circle. Minister let me remind you what happened to the person who said let them eat cake when she was told that the people had no bread - this could be the fate of your government if it fails to act.
The workers of this nation are on the point of riot when they see the difference in the way they are being treated compared to the treatment given to the so-called elite and protected among us. Ordinary people are losing their jobs and homes while the most the elite has lost is a clapped-out BMW.
Education must be a key component of a process of resettling inequality in our society. Our education system unfortunately is riven with inequalites. Minister, how can any government justify giving €100 million of taxpayers’ money to fund private fee-paying schools? This government came to power by a combination of Fine Gael and Labour. During the election campaign we were constantly being told that this would be a new Ireland. A new Ireland, we would expect, would provide education for local communities, regardless of their economic circumstances or religion. Schools should be microcosms of the society we live in, so they should include young people from all socio-economic backgrounds, all abilities both physical and mental and both genders.
Private fee-paying schools have been shown time and time again to be bottom of the table when it comes to inclusivity. They are bottom with regards to embracing students with special needs. Do you not think, Minister, that it is unjust that tax payers should fund private fee paying schools to the tune of €100million. I have seen parents in local supermarkets collecting tokens to buy computers for public schools while at the same time we are funding privileged schools who can afford to build swimming pools and golf courses. Surely, Minister, this is not the type of equality that any government would advocate. This is educational apartheid and cannot be allowed to continue.
TUI is requesting you here today Minister to do something else for equality. It is time now for the government to repeal the draconian Section t37(1) of the Employment Equality Act 1998 which relates to religious schools and institutions
It allows them to discriminate against employees/potential employees on religious grounds to maintain their ethos or to prevent an individual from undermining that ethos TUI is of the view that aspects of a person’s private life might be interpreted as undermining the ethos of a particular institution. In particular, lesbian ,gay and transgender teachers are concerned that in religious run schools including Community & Comprehensive schools that being open about their sexual orientation may be prejudicial to their chances of employment and promotion and may lead to discrimination against them. This type of legislation has no place in a new Ireland please repeal this draconian section of the act.
Minister, that there are increasing problems with literacy and numeracy in our schools. The most recent PISA report appears to confirms this. As a country we enjoyed for a long time, a reputation of delivering a high quality education system. For us, this is very disappointing news. It would be over-simplistic to once again blame teachers and schools for this decline. It must be noted that when classrooms are over-crowded and when insufficient resources are given for students for whom English is not their first language, when no extra resources to special needs students, that literacy standards will inevitably drop, particularly when the inclusion agenda only seems to apply to certain schools Standards always drop if you don’t have the necessary resources to maintain them.
We in TUI clearly understand the economic state of this country. However, getting rid of teachers will not increase literacy and numeracy standards. Minister, there are many new skills that are needed. There is no doubt that there is a great need to take higher level maths and science. Initiatives are welcomed by teachers if they are given the proper resources. Project Maths will be a success story. It is also vital that we develop other skills: creative skills, critical thinking and analytical skills. We do not minister want to end up like Shanghai where the literacy and numeracy skills are excellent but they now have to teach their students how to think Let us not rear a generation of students who not cannot perform any tasks unless the instructions are written in a manual for them. A good balanced education system is what we need Minister.
We welcome the training element of FÁS being incorporated into the Department of Education and Skills. We believe that our institutes of technology and our further education sector are ideally placed to deliver this service. TUI will do all w can to assist the delivery of these skills and we believe that our institutes of technology and our further education sectors are best placed to do this I can guarantee you, Minister, that when this work is undertaken by the further education sector and our institutes of technology that there will be no issues about standards and results.
It is a national disgrace that thousands of our apprentices are left without certification due to the downturn in employment. Please, Minister, redress this. We need a new model for apprenticeship training and we need it now. It really is a case of the ostrich sticking its head in the sand if we don’t address this immediately. What is this country going to do if we have no qualified tradesmen? Do we expect the existing ones to live forever? Please give the apprenticeship issue the urgent attention it deserves and light a spark of hope for our apprentices. It is time now for fresh and innovative strategies in this area
Whilst speaking of further education, Minister, please remove the charge of €200 that is planned for further education courses. Minister, this is once again attacking those who want a second chance at education some of whom missed out the first time round. For the last number of years there has been a cap on the numbers of students we can take into our further education colleges. This cap must be removed. It does not make any economic sense to pay people to stay at home and do nothing when we could have them in our education system developing skills.
This may require a few extra teachers here and there but in the long term, Minister, it would save money. Also, Minister, the VECs are the people who have developed this further education sector since the 80s and and we want them to be given full recognition as the main providers of further education.
We are aware, Minister that many changes are on the horizon. We know that shortly that TUI will be engaged in consultation with the proposed changes to the junior cycle and we would agree that some re structuring is required. Structural change however will require re-orientation of resources and critical new investment if it is to be successful. Successful change happens when teachers and lecturers are fully consulted. TUI has a close working relationship with some educational bodies such as the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment. However it is unacceptable that TUI does not have representatives on other educational bodies where the teacher’s voice is critical.
We can’t, Minister, achieve a fully effective education change when we are overrun with form-filling and book balancing. There are too many people managing our education system who are not educationalists. They are in the main economists, administrators and business people.
We were appalled Minister that the previous minister for education practically excluded academics in its drawing up of the Hunt Report on Higher Education. TUI welcomes its findings of giving recognition to part time students There is much in this report that concerns us It shows a distinct lack of knowledge of the work being done in our institutes It is shameful that the group did not recognise that lecturers in our institutes are delivering way above international norms and way beyond what is required of their colleagues in the universities. TUI is asking you to work with us minister to ensure that the full potential of our institutes is realised and that their contribution to economic growth in this country is promoted We need more educationalists at the forefront of our system. Let us not follow the failed HSE model. Minster, I accept that these people: accountants and administrators may get the books to balance. But the damage that may be done in the process will have wreaked havoc on people’s lives.
Be careful Minister what you wish for, if you get the books to balance you may neglect educational values and we may end up creating an imbalance in society that no budget or indeed any economic upturn can fix.
The recession has brought new problems to our society and to our students. This is why, Minister, the moratorium on the posts of responsibility is a cruel blow to our young people. There is an alarming increase in problems and yet our schools are being stripped of their capabilities to look after students who are badly in need of pastoral care. Doing away with the posts of responsibility is a retrograde step. For many young people school is the only safe place they know and for many their year head is the only adult who has the time to relate to them.
Also, Minister, we have had, in our schools over the last number of years, an increase in discipline problems. That was flagged up by Maeve Martin’s report in 2006 – School Matters. Just because the recession has arrived does not meant that the discipline problem in our schools has disappeared. If anything, it has increased. We need year heads to ensure that proper codes of discipline are in train so that the learning rights of all our students and the safety of our students and teachers is protected.
Minister, teaching is a lot more than delivering subject knowledge. Sometimes when we look at our schools and our students, we ask the wrong questions. We have a tendency to ask such questions as ‘How many points did Johnny or Mary get in their Leaving Cert?’. But too often we don’t ask the more important questions:
How is Johnny or Mary’. Our year heads, through their pastoral care, do huge work in this area. For too many young people like Johnny and Mary, the classroom is the only safe place they know. Please consider lifting the moratorium on posts of responsibility and then if we are asked, how is Johnny or how is Mary we will be able to give the right answer.
We have to face up to the fact, Minister, that education is the only currency that this country has. You, Minister, have the most powerful portfolio in this government. You have the power to put this country back on track. You are the one who must push the idea that this can only be done through education. You cannot dispute the theme of our congress this year, which states that education is the way forward. It is a way forward that will work. It will not work, however if we are going to treat our newly qualified graduates less favourably than our predecessors. A vibrant education system needs to attract highly skilled and motivated graduates who want to teach
A good career structure will attract the brightest and most committed. Our children do not deserve anything less.
Finally, Minister, you have indicated that you want change; you want us to do more with less. TUI has always embraced change. In fact it has often been at the forefront of change. However, we will not embrace changes that will damage the quality of the education system of our young and adult learners.
There is no doubt that we all face turbulent times ahead. TUI members have always shown themselves to be strong in the face of adversity. We will work with you, Minister, during these difficult times, We like you want to build an education system that will be a credit to you, to ourselves but most importantly to future generations. TUI wishes you courage and success in your new office and we hope that in time you will be the third Minister for Education that TUI and the people of Ireland will remember for all the right reasons.