Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

It is my view that it is important for children to avail of the opportunity to exercise at school and that children should be able to run and move freely in the school yard unless there are very compelling reasons for individual schools to prohibit such activity.

The Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005 sets out the responsibilities on individual school management authorities to have a safety statement in place in their schools. It is also a matter for school authorities to determine school policies, taking into account any health and safety risks to children running in the school yard and to put appropriate safeguards in place to mitigate any potential risk to the school community.

As part of the management of the risks, there is an onus on boards of management to ensure, as appropriate, that they have put in place comprehensive insurance cover for schools. Boards are advised by my Department to ensure that all such insurances are effective and maintained as are necessary to safeguard the school, the board and the trustees against all public liability.

A key element of the management of the risks is ensuring there is adequate supervision of pupils in school yards. The Education Act assigns each board of management and principal teacher responsibility for the day-to-day management of schools. School principals are obliged to organise supervision for the order and general behaviour of pupils during school hours. In particular, they should organise and participate in the effective supervision of the pupils during breaks, lunch-breaks, assembly and dismissal. While the Department does not issue specific guidelines on requirements for supervision of pupils of different ages, it acknowledges that the degree of supervision required of school authorities varies with the circumstances, including the age of pupils.

While appreciating that it is not always possible to eliminate all risks, it should nevertheless be possible to manage them in such a manner that pupils can run in school yards provided it is done in an orderly and supervised manner.

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