Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have a number of questions for the delegates. The issue of carrying technique is interesting, as is the issue of the quality of schoolbags. Are there minimum standards for schoolbags? There is a wide variation in quality, but features such as hip straps would make a significant difference in weight distribution. If there are no minimum standards, should we consider introducing them? That might have cost implications, but perhaps the State might consider providing a subsidy in the same way as it does for meals, books and school clothing. Are schoolbags included in the existing school clothing scheme for low-income families?

In terms of Dr. Dockrell's research, much of the discussion centred on the mean travelling time for students to school, which is approximately ten minutes, but travel time for some children can be much longer than that. They might have to walk five minutes to the bus stop and on boarding the bus all the seats could be occupied and they might be standing on the bus for another five to ten minutes. They could be carrying a bag on their back for a period ranging from 15 minutes up to an hour a day. Were there any outliers that showed that there was a greater incidence of skeletal muscular injury among students who had longer travel trips to school?

Similar to Deputy O'Sullivan's point, I am conscious that teachers are already under a great deal of pressure in terms of administration, but we should also be talking about the publishers. It should not be difficult to break up large textbooks into a number of small modules that could be sold together and taken home from school as required. Often a student will only need to refer to five to 12 pages of a textbook in a particular subject. That might be the case for five or six subjects and suddenly a student is bringing home 1,000 to 1,200 pages of text, particularly at post-primary school level. Should the possibility be explored of larger textbooks being sold as a unit that could be separated into modules which could be brought home from school as required? I take on board the point regarding avoiding an over-reliance on textbooks and I would be interested in that aspect. That is an educational issue to some extent, aside from the health implications involved, but it is an interesting point.

Are Mr. Paul Beddy and Ms Áine Lynch aware of any schools that have identified models of best practice that they would recommend be followed? In that context, I note the responses to question five in the questionnaire used in the survey of primary schools show that close to 30% of teachers stagger the homework. Is that a practice that should be considered, and if there are models of best practice, how can they be incorporated into guidelines? A great deal of the issues involve relate to the level of homework given. The 15 year old me could not live with myself if I did not take this opportunity to call for the abolition of homework.