Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

Like my colleagues, I congratulate Deputy Brian Hayes, the Fine Gael spokesperson on education, on tabling this motion, which is both appropriate and timely. I listened with a growing feeling of nausea last night to the Minister for Education and Science as he accused my party of political opportunism. I am not quite sure what that means but my definition of political opportunism is a political party which, for personal electoral gain, misleads people at election time. What we are engaged in is not political opportunism. We are seeking to call a Government to account for making false promises that affect schools all over the country.

I wish to deal with the situation in one particular school in my constituency and briefly refer to other schools which are experiencing difficulties of a similar nature. Scoil Colmcille Naofa in Knocklyon is one of the biggest primary schools in the country. At the hands of this Government it has, in the past six months, suffered what could be best described as a double-whammy. We have gone through a piece of theatre in successive general elections in the Dublin South constituency. In 2002, St. Colmcille's in Knocklyon was promised a new school because 500 of the 1,500 pupils in it had been occupying prefabricated buildings for far too many years. The same promise was recirculated in 2007 and the accompanying promise, given across the length and breadth of the country, was that there would be a reduction in class size. When it comes to education, particularly primary education, we all know that size matters. It matters particularly with regard to children getting the education to which they are entitled and teachers working in an environment which allows them to use their talents to best effect for the benefit of children.

St. Colmcille's school will be denied a teacher in September, a teacher who is working there at present. St. Colmcille's, perhaps naively — if it was naive, so was the rest of the education sector — believed the Government when it said it would have a 26:1 ratio and operated some forward planning to determine how it would deal with that in the context of the term starting next September. The school intended to turn six classes at junior infant level into seven. As a result of losing a teacher, 26 families who had expected their children to start junior infants in September await, disappointed. In addition to being faced with their children starting a year later than they had anticipated, they are now also possibly faced with the additional and unexpected cost of child care.

It is grossly unfair to this school. I welcome representatives from the school who are in the Public Gallery this evening. It is grossly unfair to them to deprive the school of a teacher. It is also grossly unfair that a false promise that they would have a new school resulted, in November 2007, in the Government stopping the school from seeking planning permission. That school is now condemned to keep its pupils for an undefined number of years in prefabricated buildings, as are a series of other schools in south Dublin. From Leopardstown to Marley to Ballyroan and Loretto in Rathfarnham, children are in prefabricated buildings that are long past their sell-by date.

I ask that for once Government Deputies who treat education seriously support this motion. This motion deserves support. Our children deserve the best possible education and they do not deserve to be betrayed by false promises made by opportunistic politicians at election time.

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