Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)

I seek the adjournment of the Dáil under Standing Order 31 to discuss a matter of national importance, namely, the reply given in the Dáil by the Minister for Education and Science to the Labour Party spokesperson on education, Deputy O'Sullivan, which showed that nationally, the teacher-pupil ratio is at an alarmingly high level and that in particular, the pupil-teacher ratio in County Kildare shows that nearly 30% or 6,351 national school children in the county are in classes of 30 to 34 pupils, and that 531 pupils are in classes of 35 to 39; and to enable the Minister to inform the Dáil how she proposes to keep her promise to reduce all class sizes to 20 pupils per class and to remove Ireland from the invidious position of having the second largest class sizes in Europe with the second lowest expenditure on national primary education in the EU.

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