Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Any criticism I make is of the Minister, not of the officials. This is a crisis that is not being dealt with at present with any sense of urgency or any sense of purpose by the Minister for Education and Skills. The officials should bring that message back to him. There are a number of easy things that the Minister could do. He could fight to restore pay equality. Young teachers have an excuse for not working in this country because they do not feel valued. They are not being paid on the same scale as their older colleagues and they are asking why should they work here. The Minister's number one priority should be to try to end that inequality, make matters right and remove an excuse for people not to teach in this country.

The Minister needs to be active in terms of the teaching diaspora. He needs to be out in Dubai encouraging, asking and pleading with teachers to come home and work in Ireland and, after he has achieved pay equality, showing them why they should do so. He needs to be out there bringing the members of that diaspora home. Many primary teachers who may be out there and who do not have permanent jobs back home or who are on career breaks should seriously consider returning as soon as possible, particularly in view of the reduction in pupil numbers at primary level. I would like Ms McDonnell to comment on this matter if possible.

With the reduction in pupil numbers at primary level, there is going to be an oversupply of primary teachers at some time in the next few years. That will make it difficult for people who want to have careers in this country because there may well be a teacher surplus at primary level at that point. That strikes me as an urgent reason why the Minister should be encouraging people and giving them a reason to come back. When there is a political controversy about this, we hear great noises from the Minister but we have heard nothing on the shortage of teachers since the various teacher conferences took place. The primary teacher shortage is going to be acute this year before it gets better.

The situation at second level is disastrous. We have heard that it is only in a range of subjects but the truth is that, with the exception of a few, practically all subjects have been affected. STEM subjects, languages, home economics and Irish were mentioned. That is a wide range of subjects that are affected by acute shortages. There are also acute shortages in the Gaelcholáistí where people need to teach through the medium of Irish and it is becoming almost impossible to give people their constitutional right to an education via the national language.

A number of things have been recommended by Fianna Fáil in our policy document and by many of the organisations that have come before this committee. I refer to the reform of the professional master of education, PME, and ending the two-year programme because it is over the top and people are emerging overqualified. There must be much more urgency in respect of increasing the number of undergraduates. That was mentioned but it is badly needed. We need to let in more easily people who are on career breaks or retired teachers. The purpose of this would not be to supplant existing teachers but to fill gaps. Substitute panels at primary level would go a long way to dealing with the crisis there. The pupil-teacher ratio will be decreasing in September thanks to Fianna Fáil but that is going to lead to pinch points, to say the least, in respect of supply next year. We also recommended a national summit to highlight this. That could be done in conjunction with a serious campaign to bring teachers who are abroad home.

I am appealing to teachers in Dubai, once the pay equality situation is resolved - we hope that it will be and we want it to be - to seriously consider coming home to teach. They are badly needed and badly wanted. The future of our children, the personal development of our students and our educational, economic and social future depends on having teachers. Some element of a model system to predict supply trends must be introduced. The Minister has been far too slow in dealing with this crisis. There is no sense of urgency. If I were Minister for Education and Skills, this would be priority number one.

We can have all the strategies for STEM subjects, in respect of which the Government has published one, and foreign languages, in respect of which it has not but Fianna Fáil has, we want, but they cannot be implemented if we do not have teachers. This is foundational in the Department of Education and Skills. Everything else in the Department builds from the ability to make sure we have enough teachers in our schools. We need urgency on this because everything else is press releases, trick-acting and media opportunities for the Minister while the system falls apart as a result of the fact that we do not have enough teachers.