Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

First, I thank all the contributors to this debate. The number of speakers is an indication of the importance of education in the forthcoming budget for Members on all sides of the House.

The Minister quite rightly corrected us last night on the figures we quoted in respect of the OECD. However, the figure he quoted is from 2010 as well, so that figure is almost three years old. Given the level of cuts in recent years, we could spend another hour debating what is the actual spend on education relative to our GDP. The bigger question, however, is whether what we are investing in education is being directed to the right places. Is it tackling educational disadvantage and is it improving our educational outcomes? Are we getting value for money? That is the bigger debate we must have, be it in this Chamber or in the committee. Let us move away from the statistics and get down to the nuts and bolts of the matter.

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