Ms Annette Dolan:

The availability of such teachers to do substitute work or fill-in work is an issue. The difficulty that arises in terms of getting a contract of indefinite duration is that one will only get a contract of indefinite duration by staying with the same employer. I was contacted recently by a teacher who had worked for 14 years in separate schools and so still had no contract of indefinite duration. The reason that that is the case is that she teaches a minority subject, so even though she has found work in different parts of the country, mainly filling in for maternity leaves because it is a minority subject-----