David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Good. I thank our guests for being here and for their presentation. They have covered so much. I noticed that recently they had a paper on climate change, much of which had to do with technology, electric cars and so on. Have they looked at all at the challenges posed by rising sea levels and the kinds of skills we might need in the future to deal with that? I have here a book by John Englander, Moving to Higher Ground. I am not sure if I can show it. It is frightening reading in that it shows that in the next 30 or 40 years the seas will rise one or two metres, depending on what happens, no matter what we do. I put it to the witnesses that we will need a whole new set of skills to deal with that, whether to put up all kinds of sea defences, to move to higher ground or whatever else. They might comment on that, please, because it is one of those things that is put on the long finger and that people are not talking about, although I know that the Dutch are doing a lot of work on this area. They would, of course. They recognise the danger and the challenges. If the seas rise by a metre in the near future, that will lead to much of cities such as Cork, Dublin, Galway, Limerick and Wexford being under water, and there is nothing we can do about it. No matter what we do now regarding the warming of the earth, the damage is already done and the sea is already rising. That is what I have read in many publications.

Has the expert group any interaction with the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment? A lot of the debate up to now has been about education. I agree with Mr. Donohoe when he says we have to start very early on. Have the witnesses looked at the way in which maths is taught in schools? Have they any knowledge of a whole new concept being pioneered in Stanford, PolyUp mathematics? If not, I ask them to have a look at it and come back to me with a reaction at some stage if that is in order. This whole approach involves critical thinking and analysis, problem solving, innovation, teamwork - all the skills the witnesses have been talking about in their various reports.

I notice that in Finland they have a Committee for the Future in the parliament. I am not sure if Mr. Donohoe or Dr. Power has come across its work. It looks ahead 30 or 40 years to see what kind of challenge will face Finland in that time, reports to parliament every year and holds hearings. It is quite an interesting provision they have in their parliament. Maybe it is something we should suggest we do in our Parliament as well. I do not think our committees are doing that at all.

Could the witnesses comment on career guidance and counselling? I know that Mr. Donohoe is also involved in the Apprenticeship Council and we have spoken about apprenticeships this morning. Quite a lot of apprentices take up their apprenticeship roles and leave quite early on. I think up to a fifth, maybe more, of them leave and do not follow through. I am concerned as to why that is happening. Is it that they pick the wrong job initially and it is not what they expected it to be? Are they guided the wrong way at the start? What is going on? It seems to be a huge waste of time and energy, especially when we need people in the various apprenticeships.

If somebody from 30 years ago - a number of us were around at that time - were transported to our time, with the language used, they would not know what cloud hosting, consumer relationship, marketing software, web apps or VPN means. We have changed our language so much, and in 30 years' time I wonder what it will be like - that is, of course, if we are not all under water. I will leave it at that.