Dr. Nicholas Breakwell:

There is no formal workforce modelling system in place in Ireland. This was a point raised by the Teaching Council of Ireland and in other fora. It would appear to be extremely difficult to achieve. Therefore, in the absence of any formal measures, Hibernia College, along with other providers, departmental officials and the Teaching Council of Ireland, is attempting to make a guesstimate of what the future demand for teachers might be. We have commenced our post-primary teacher programme because we believe that by the time the students graduate in any substantial numbers in 2014 there will be a demand for post-primary teachers because of the significant demographic explosion of which the committee members will be aware.

As members of the committee mentioned, there appears to be an over-supply of teachers in the post-primary market at the moment. That over-supply is being funded and provided by the State because Hibernia College has not yet produced any graduates from those programmes. There is a need to look at both State provision as well as private provision.