Mr. John Boyle:

Perhaps I will begin. Obviously if the flu vaccine becomes available, there will be a hierarchy and I imagine the high-risk, vulnerable and elderly, as well as healthcare workers, will be at the top of it. However, the Government has deemed it essential to keep schools open, which indicates that the definition of essential workers includes teachers, SNAs and school secretaries. I was very disappointed the flu vaccine was not made available to all front-line staff in schools but we are moving on from that now. The most important vaccine is the new one for Covid-19. It would give great reassurance to parents and students if they knew teachers were vaccinated. It would also mean our workers would be much more confident going into the workplace. This particularly the case when, as I said, a teacher has 35 children in his or her classroom from 35 different families. There has to be a risk there and many staff in education have been infected, despite the way this issue is being portrayed in the media.

On the €25 capitation, I based my sums on the average of 25 children per class. I know that some classes have many more pupils. When we multiply €25 by 25 we get €625 per year. With a school year of 193 days, that amounts to approximately €3.50 per day. How on earth could any cleaner do enhanced cleaning in a classroom on a daily basis for €3.50? When they got that money most schools assumed it was for the term up to Christmas and they expected to get at least twice as much after Christmas. We are calling for that because the money is running out.

On the supply panels scheme, it must be acknowledged that 3,150 schools were outside the scheme when the pilot was initiated this time last year. There are 2,100 schools included this year but why were the other 1,000 not included? The first reason was the pressure caused by the time needed to organise it. However, it seems the Government was not prepared to put in the extra 50 or 60 teachers. The gas thing is it would not cost any money because there is a budget in place for substitute teachers in any event. There is certainly in the supply panel that a school will have a far better chance of getting a substitute teacher and there is also certainty for the workers and children that it will be consistent, with the same person coming into the school. The scheme should definitely be enhanced after Christmas to look after the 1,000 remaining schools.