Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is timely to focus on education as children return to school after the summer break. In addition, students are returning to universities this month and the budget is coming up in October.

Last Saturday, I was speaking to a special needs teacher on the Luas and heard at first hand, a blow-by-blow account of how low morale is among teachers. That teacher opened up and it happens to us all the time. She said how she used to look forward to teaching in school but now she dreads it. That woman has spent half her life in the classroom. In the majority of classrooms around the country, teachers are fighting against pressures resulting from years of incremental cutbacks. They are tired and overworked. The teacher I met on the Luas said she and her colleagues are completely worn out from the past few years of treatment that undermines their work and ability to teach.

She said that what is happening in the community and in the home is being reflected in the classroom which is not isolated. She said that all the pressures in society, that we constantly discuss here, have to be dealt with daily in schools. Teachers are at breaking point, as can be seen by the decision of ASTI members to reject the Haddington Road agreement and vote for some form of industrial action. It arises from frustration and the teachers' powerlessness in the system.

The teacher I spoke to said they are not doing this for selfish or self-centred reasons, they are doing it because they see the hard won education system crumbling in front of them. They are at the coalface and can see the degree of cutbacks in special needs education and the heartbreaking effect this is having on the lives of children and their families.

The Minister may say there are no cutbacks in that area, but we know there are because we deal with families every day who have difficulties in trying to get their children through the system. We have debated on many occasions in this Chamber the desire for a seamless transfer of children from primary to secondary school, yet that has not happened. That must be a priority because there are too many trap-doors in the system, particularly for children with special needs.

The teacher on the Luas spoke of her rights being trampled on, as well as the lack of fairness and equality in the Government's cuts and the austerity measures that are impacting on the most vulnerable.

When will the Government wake up and acknowledge that teachers and schools can take no more cuts? Our educational system is in need of drastic reform, but austerity measures are not the response that is needed.

This year, Barnardos' school costs survey highlighted again that, on average, parents are paying €350 in back to school costs for a child in senior infants, €400 for children in fourth class in primary school, and €785 for children going into first year in secondary school.

Families are being crippled by the Government's austerity measures and budget cutbacks. The last thing they should have to worry about is how to afford to send their children to school. Parents are now being forced to cut back on other essential services. We know from Barnardos and others the difficulties that parents face each September in getting a basic education for their children.

One of the biggest school expenses for parents - and it is an issue I have consistently raised in the Dáil - arises from schools forcing students to wear expensive uniforms. In England it can cost just £2 to stamp a school crest on a uniform. Here, however, 74% of parents of primary school children and 97% of parents of secondary school children told Barnardos that they had to buy uniforms with the school crest on them, which greatly added to the costs involved.

When I was Sinn Féin's education spokesperson, I publicly called on the Minister to proactively introduce measures to eliminate this school uniform racket. Parents do not want excuses, they want to hear what the Minister can do about this matter. It is true that each school board of management is responsible for matters of school policy and governance, but they are also responsible to the school patron and ultimately to the Minister for Education and Skills.

As my colleagues said earlier, we want to see a halt to cuts. We support the Minister when he is arguing at the Cabinet table for education funding. We believe it can be done through alternative measures, and it must be done.

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