Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The overall budgetary allocation, which is quite modest, is €500,000 for the implementation of the strategy. Deputy O'Brien is correct in saying that €70,000 was identified for a specific training programme for parents, to be administered by the National Parents Council. We will see how that unfolds. The previous set of guidelines were signed off on in 1993. These have been the product of a lot of good engagement and I welcome Deputy O'Brien's support, as well as the support of Fianna Fáil, over recent months in respect of that.

My view is that we should see how this is working and whether parents are being properly empowered vis-à-vis schools to be able to react in a coherent way if there are incidences of bullying in whatever shape or form. More resources can be made available. Before we start moving to a statutory basis, which implies that there will be penalties, obligations and legal requirements of some description, I would prefer to have them operate on a non-statutory basis until we learn from them. If such a basis is required in the future, I am open to considering, it but I would need to be persuaded by the evidence and we do not have that yet.

See this speech in context