Dara Murphy (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Ms O'Sullivan and her colleagues. Without sounding too patronising, I compliment them on taking this initiative, which I am sure has taken up a lot of their time and energy. This is my first experience in my seven years as a parliamentarian to engage with people who are below the voting age, the issue of whether 16 year olds should have the right to vote being another area of discussion. There are two separate elements to today's presentation and petition, namely, the extension of time for the examination and the pre-examination or mock examination process. Ms O'Sullivan is correct that it has been a number of years since some members sat their intermediate or junior certificate examinations - Deputy Cassells was particularly upset in this regard. In may case, it was the intermediate certificate examination. I have three daughters who in the past five years have done between them three junior certificate examinations and two leaving certificate examinations. The pre-junior certificate examinations are the preparation for the junior certificate examination and the junior certificate and pre-leaving certificate examinations are preparation for the leaving certificate examinations.

I have always been struck by the fact that the State plays a very small role in the mock examinations process and that preparation and marking of these papers is paid for by the schools and parents, respectively. I accept Ms O'Sullivan's point that the new curriculum made the mock examinations very difficult for her but does she accept that next year's junior certificate students will at least have the benefit of this year's junior certification examination papers? Does she still believe schools can organise mock or pre-examinations or does she believe the Department should have a role because it did not have a role in the past?

I believe it does need a role because in terms of the nature of this examination, it has not provided a structure or a marking scheme so no matter how many years pass, it will still be a surprise because examinations such as history and geography have a very clear number of sections and structures and it is beneficial to practice with past papers but from now on it will no longer be beneficial because there is no set structure or consistency. As I mentioned, with the sample papers, our examination had four sections but one of the sample papers had two, another had three and another had four so the idea of more past papers will not be very beneficial, and I believe that guidelines need to be introduced.