Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I confirm I am in Leinster House.

We always learn more from these interactions which makes them so worthwhile. Even concerning some of the language used, I have learned so much from the contributors with whom I have had interactions in the past. The kind of language used, such as the "D" in ASD unit standing for disorder, needs to be challenged. We speak about training for teachers. It is not just about teachers but entire school communities. Society needs to up its game in order to have a fully functioning Republic which actually treats everybody with the proper level of dignity in the space in which they interact with the State.

I am concerned about us having the same debate in 20 years' time, over and back. Is there something fundamentally wrong with the education system that it needs a constitutional referendum? We have created a system which is not a State system, but a State-funded system. It places all the power with patron bodies and boards of management with which a Minister could only interact recently. Fundamentally, that is where the power is. We are always going to be just tinkering with it unless we fundamentally overhaul the ethic and belief system around the education system.

We cannot take a foreign model of special education and introduce it in Ireland because it will not fit. It is designed not to fit. People running around the place and trying to go outside their communities in order to go to school and chasing down resources is madness. Other jurisdictions, in particular the Nordic countries, would think it was crazy that people could not just access these services as a right in a State-funded school system. We do not have a State system. We have a State-funded system.

A fantastic opportunity is being afforded to the Government in terms of a constitutional convention-citizens’ assembly on education. Are these the big questions we need to start asking? It should not just be questions about money here or there, or a unit here or there, or a change in legislation here or there. Are we going to have this row in perpetuity unless we radically overhaul what the education system does and what it is there for? The child is not at the centre of the education system. It is between what the patron body wants, what a teachers' union wants, what a political party wants and what a programme for Government says. Rarely is the child at the centre of this discussion.