Michael Colreavy (Sligo-North Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

While I am delighted to see the Minister of State, Deputy Alex White, in the Chamber and I thank him for his attendance, in a way I am sorry the Minister for Education and Skills, Deputy Quinn, is not present and I will tell Members the reason. It is now approximately 432 days since I brought to his attention and that of this House an incident between a then 13-year old child and a principal of a school in Sligo, resulting in the young boy's refusal, since 2009, to go back to school. I gave the Minister documentary evidence detailing the medical, psychiatric and psychological impact on the child. I outlined how the child had threatened to run away from home or worse. I detailed the efforts made by the boy's parents to resolve the issue through contacts with the principal, the school board of management, the National Educational Welfare Board, various offices and officials within the Departments of Education and Skills and Children and Youth Affairs and with politicians from all political parties.

The Minister, Deputy Quinn, stated in this Chamber on 16 November 2011 that he was concerned about the case detail and would take a personal interest in the matter. He stated "the amount of time this impasse has existed is simply unacceptable in a democratic republic". I took heart from those words and perhaps I was politically naive but when I left the Chamber that night, I was hopeful that he would do something to right this grievous wrong and would introduce policies and the necessary legislation to ensure there could never again be a recurrence of such an incident. I do not know what happened between the time the Minister left the Chamber on the night of 16 November 2011 and my submission of some follow-up questions, approximately three or four weeks later, but it quickly became apparent that the status quo would be maintained, that boards of management would continue to investigate themselves when accused of wrong­doing and that the Minister and the Department of Education and Skills would continue to keep an arm's-length distance between legislators and policy-makers and those who deliver services. This is not delegation of responsibility but is abrogation of responsibility.

In a country and at a time when one can no longer claim ignorance of the damage done by unregulated institutions, how can Members, with any credibility, continue to perpetuate an education structure in which boards of management are self-regulating, self-controlling, self-accounting, self-investigating and self-reporting?

This Sinn Féin amending Bill does not seek to overthrow the whole education system. Nor does it seek to make sweeping changes to the way boards of management work nor to the relationships between boards of management and the Departments of Education and Skills and Children and Youth Affairs. All it seeks to do is provide for binding, mandatory measures to be imposed on the boards of management of each school to ensure that the welfare of a child is adequately safeguarded with regard to all forms of bullying that may occur within a school. The Bill also places a requirement on the Minister for Education and Skills to introduce legislation to give legal status to existing guidelines, and to review the guidelines every two years to ensure they are being strictly followed in order to ensure the safety and well-being of each pupil in a school in Ireland.

Unless the Minister can demonstrate to me and others within and outside the Dáil that he proposes to quickly propose legislation - not guidelines - to ensure the current legislative and reporting flaws are addressed, he should support this Bill as an honest basis for further discussion and deliberation with all groups. The child I spoke of in my introduction is now a young man of 16 who remains psychologically damaged. He continues to be educated at home at the expense of the State and that is because of our failure as legislators to provide him, his parents and others like him with safeguards to ensure his safety and well-being. He has been denied access to redress when things go wrong, and he, his parents and others like him are being denied justice. Please let this young man be the last such case.

See this speech in context