Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)

I move amendment No. 12:

In page 5, between lines 28 and 29, to insert the following:

"(4A) In hearing and determining an appeal under this section against a decision to which subsection (1)(c) applies an appeals committee shall have regard to regulations under section 33(g), which the Minister shall make within 6 months from the enactment of the Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2007.".

This amendment deals with regulations under section 33 of the principal Act on enrolment of children into schools. I am seeking to ensure that the Minister will introduce regulations under this section because I am concerned that, although schools are putting in place enrolment policies as required by legislation, some policies are succeeding in excluding certain children.

I am aware the Minister is also concerned about this issue because she has referred on several occasions to schools cherry-picking students or finding ways to avoid accepting certain children. In some cases, they manage to avoid refusing children outright by suggesting they might be better catered for down the road. However, other schools find ways of excluding children through their enrolment policies. A case was brought to my attention in which a Traveller child was excluded from a school even though vacancies existed. The child was excluded on the basis of the school's enrolment policy, although I do not know the exact content of that policy. I am concerned that schools are able to write enrolment policies which exclude certain children. My amendment provides that the Minister shall make regulations within six months of the enactment of this Bill.

As I noted on Committee Stage, no Minister has ever used the power available to him or her to make regulations. The former Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Noel Dempsey, suggested using that power in the context of a problem which arose in my constituency with regard certain second level schools which were not as inclusive in enrolling children as we might have hoped. He initiated a process whereby the principals of all the schools concerned were obliged to introduce a system that would ensure all children had a place. That process was not particularly effective during its first year of operation but has since improved and some other schools outside the city have also been included. Thankfully, children in Limerick have been facilitated in finding places, but considerable work had to be done to reach that point. I supported the then Minister's suggestion about introducing regulations because I believed it would prevent schools from avoiding their obligations, particularly regarding children with special needs or from certain addresses.

The problems which arose in Limerick also affect other parts of the country but the system in place in Limerick has not been established elsewhere. Children continue to be excluded by the way in which enrolment policies are written. The Minister could specify enrolment criteria in regulations, although I do not say she should write the enrolment policies for schools because a degree of flexibility should be permitted.

The section which provided for regulations to be made by a Minister was not included in the Act for nothing. While I am aware the Act is cross-referenced with the Education (Welfare) Act 2000 and has to comply with equality legislation, that does not remove the need to introduce regulations under section 33.

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