Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

We will be moving to have in place by autumn a system whereby the school will make available a panel of substitute teachers that it has in mind should a necessity to hire somebody arise and that panel will be open to scrutiny by members of the school community, the board of management and the parents, and perhaps by a wider public if that is necessary. At the same time, teachers who are seeking work, even substitute work, will be shown how to get onto that panel. We are still working on the detail and the operational modalities of that system. Ideally, what I want for the forthcoming academic year is a panel system where parents and others who are interested will know that if a vacancy arises at short notice, the substitute would be drawn from that group of people. That is the ideal situation as far as we are concerned and we are moving towards it.

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