Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin North Central, Labour)
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The issue of competition between schools is a driving factor in many of the unnecessary burdens that are placed on parents. Although the central issues here are voluntary contributions, books and uniforms, there is a legislative way we could go down in terms of changing the relationship we have with patron bodies. Patron bodies guard their independence as sacred and the responsibility of the Department is merely to fund them, pay for their teachers, fix their buildings and leave everything else to them. We must change the nature of that relationship.

The Finnish position is completely different because there is no competition between Finnish schools. In the school district, there is one school. They do not have a tapestry of 3,500 primary schools which they must fund, light, heat, insure, etc., which is what we spend much of our funding on.

While the Department must do what it has to do, there is a responsibility of leadership on patron bodies and individual boards of management that could drive down these costs. There must be a cultural shift. We should be reverting to the ideal of free education and it should not be culturally acceptable for some of these practices to be allowable within the school system.