Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

I have heard the arguments and I have met representatives of the Institute of Guidance Counsellors. I understand the difficulties associated with the modern world in which we all live. Many regular subject teachers have told me that they would probably be the first to notice a difference if a pupil was experiencing external pressures. I am talking about pastoral care rather than career guidance, which deals with course and career choices. If a student is a B+ student in whatever subject the teacher is teaching but his or her performance or behaviour in the class starts to deteriorate, that subject teacher, in many cases, is the first to notice a change. He or she may be the first to ask Jimmy or Rory what is troubling him, and he or she may well refer him to the counsellor at that stage. The school is a totality and, in law and in the corporate spirit of the school, has a pastoral responsibility for the welfare of its pupils. The guidance counsellor certainly has special skills, if he or she has the qualification, but most if not all guidance counsellors start life as secondary school teachers in the same way as those who continue to be subject teachers.

We are, unfortunately, in a position in which I must do more with less, and one of the most efficient ways of doing this - I received advice in this regard - was to allocate the ex-quota component of guidance counsellors into the mainstream secondary school allocation. I am sorry I was not able to be here for yesterday's debate on this, but I will repeat what I said on Tuesday night: 42% of the 730 secondary schools in the country have no specialist guidance counsellor who is exclusively there for that purpose.

See this speech in context