Pauline O'Reilly (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the four witnesses for coming in. I wish to say at the outset that the reason there are not many of us in the room at one time is purely to do with the pandemic. I was watching and heard everything the witnesses said. I do not want to repeat questions that were asked before.

I can hear the witnesses' frustration. I have spoken to members of their organisations, at a local level in Galway and at a national level. I know the frustrations that are there.

I express my thanks to the trade unions, teaching staff, caretakers and so on. With that in mind, I will raise a couple of ongoing issues. I am supportive of pay equality. It is absolutely outrageous that we still have pay inequality.

I have previously been in touch with Fórsa and have gone on the picket line with school secretaries in Galway. How do the representatives from Fórsa feel this matter is progressing? What more could we do to support school secretaries?

We are obviously in an emergency and a lot of promises have been made. Some of the witnesses said there have been successes and we have moved forwards. I would like to hear a little more about that. What promises have been given to the trade unions that they believe have not been fulfilled? A promise has been made about the availability of another tranche of money for IT equipment. Do our guests have concerns about not having received that? Is that commitment not enough? I am asking about the different commitments that have been given and whether the witnesses want more commitments.

Mr. Gillespie spoke about the important issue of ventilation. I am the former chair of a school and I was also involved in starting a school. It is still in prefabs so I completely understand the problem. We have looked at getting energy grants, for instance, but schools cannot afford the co-funding element. We need to look at that issue. I would love to hear suggestions from the witnesses who have obviously thought about this a lot. We are in a pandemic at the moment but there are other issues, such as climate and biodiversity, that I am interested in and with which we also need to deal. Do the organisations represented have an understanding of what teachers and leaders within the school community believe will be essential over the next year or two?

I hope I have been clear in the questions I have asked. I did not want to repeat everything. The issue around special needs assistants is critical and we need to do more. I would love to know if the witnesses have any details in that regard. It is difficult for me to say this, as a representative of a Government party, but if they have any information to show there might be greater infection rates among SNAs, it is important that we know that. I recognise that the problem is staff representatives are not being given all information but if they have even anecdotal evidence, it would be good to know.