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

I will not comment specifically on Deputy Harris’s area because I am not as well informed as he is, but in some areas there is close co-operation between the various primary schools in order that people know who has applied and there is a certain amount of sharing of information. However, that is not always the case. In fact, at the other end of the spectrum one has schools beating the bushes trying to find children that they can bring into a smaller school to maintain their teacher numbers. Somewhere between those two extremes we must find a way forward that can take the stress away from parents. I refer primarily to primary school places. In some cases parents will not know for some time whether their four year old will get a place this September.

The situation is due in the first instance to massive growth in population numbers. A White Paper was published by the Department of Education and Skills in 1998 which said that the big task facing the primary school system in Ireland was managing the decline in population. We had fewer than 480,000 schoolchildren and all the projections were that the population would decline. We now have 525,000 and growing. That means we must find extra space. It also means building bigger schools. There is a certain reluctance among some to contemplate that. One can provide far more accommodation in a much more effective and economic way with a two stream or three stream school, which is 24 classes or more. Some people do not want to have their child in such a school or say that it was not the kind of school they attended. My primary function, and that of the Department, is to make sure that no parent is deprived of a school place in the first instance and preferably a school place of their choice. Providing the accommodation in the first instance must be a priority.

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