Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party)

Like the cutbacks in DEIS schools, which we debated in Private Members' time last week, this issue shows that the Government has taken part in the butchery of our education system. Decisions have been taken that are short-sighted and narrow-minded and will have a serious impact on young people growing up in Ireland today and on society as a whole.

Measures such as the one we are debating this evening show that the Minister for Education and Skills was party to a lie when he said his Government and his Department would protect the pupil teacher ratio. That is not so. That promise is being negatively impacted upon by the decision on guidance teachers. It will have a cataclysmic effect on young people and on education standards.

When guidance teachers are forced back into the classroom, as the Government would have it, the non-permanent teachers who now carry out teaching functions in other classes will lose their jobs. Some 700 jobs are on the line as a result of this measure. What signal does that send and what record is that for a Government that says it is in favour of job creation? Where is the economic sense in educating our young people to be teachers if we then export them to other countries? It makes no sense at all. Undoubtedly, what is being done will make it much harder for young teachers to get a job and it will have an impact on those currently in employment. That alone is utterly scandalous.

The other aspect to be considered is the impact on students themselves. As other Deputies have said, what is essentially being lost is the one-to-one care and counselling service, which will be replaced by a more class-based approach and, probably, a more career-based approach. In modern Ireland, that is not enough. The Government has paid extensive lip service to mental health but this measure alone will have a massive impact on the mental health of very vulnerable teenagers. I refer to 300,000 young people who, in many instances, because of the lack of adequate counselling services outside the school system, will have no access to trained counsellors to help them with all the difficulties that affect them because of the expense. If the Government does not reverse the cut, it will have a detrimental impact on those young people and society as a whole. I hope the unions take this matter on. The Government feels it can withstand the pressure but it will meet the hot breath of people in the workplace, parents, students and teachers. It will not get away with this one.

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