Mr. Paul Byrne:

We are looking for more administration support. Irish exemptions are just one part of an increasing workload that has been exacerbated by Covid. There is an awful lot more to deal with in the support of students. We in schools are still feeling the effects of the loss of learning that happened during the Covid pandemic.

The level of administrative work has been increasing the whole time. We are looking for more administration support to help us do what people go into principalship for, which is to lead the learning in schools and to develop the capacity of all the students and teachers. If principals are snowed under with administrative work, it leaves less time to do the core work.