Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----and the anxieties and concerns about the education process. A discretionary allocation for supervision is now available to new teachers which was not available in February of this year because allowances were all suspended. That leaves teachers starting off in the profession on a salary of €32,000 per year.

This is part of a very difficult situation for the country. Protests, as the Deputy is well aware as he is involved in most of them, are perfectly legitimate in Ireland, provided they do not get out of hand. While it is a challenging time for everybody, clearly, the Government has set a programme for recruitment of new teachers in the programme for Government and, because of the budgetary constraints set out, the starting salary for new teachers in the profession is reduced from what it was.

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