Shane Ross (Dublin South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

This is the third time I have raised this subject in recent years. I do not do so on an ideological basis, although there is an ideology among those who for some reason wish to see the pupil-teacher ratio in fee-paying schools increase. There is a large body of opinion that the Government has simply got this wrong, because it sees private schools and fee-paying schools as an elite body who are determined to stay elite and somehow above other forms of education. That is not the case. What is wanted here is a degree of choice among people who save the State a large amount of money and who in many cases, although not all, make huge sacrifices to send their children to fee-paying schools. While some people spend their money on other luxuries, some of those parents who send their children to fee-paying schools are not able to do that because they have made a decision, which they are quite entitled to do, to send their children to fee-paying schools for all sorts of different reasons.

What I am looking for today is an assurance from the Minister of State that the pupil-teacher ratio in private schools will be reduced to ensure equality between fee-paying and non-fee-paying schools. This is a particularly sensitive issue among minority and Protestant schools. The Minister of State will be aware that parents wishing to have their children educated in the Protestant ethos or another ethos often have to send their children to boarding schools at great cost to themselves, in terms of the fees payable at those schools, and to the children, in terms of the pupil-teacher ratio therein, because often when the pupil-teacher ratio increases something has to give, and it is the children who suffer through a loss of facilities and so on, including extra-curricular facilities.

As the Minister of State will be aware, the pupil-teacher ratio in fee-paying schools was increased to 23:1 while that in the free education sector is 19:1. Parents are seeking an assurance that this trend has stopped and that it may well be possible in the next budget, given that times, we are told, are now more prosperous, to reverse it in order that the ethos of the Protestant schools and the rights of those who want to send their children to private schools are preserved. There is no reason there should be any difference between one type of school and another. Those who send their children to private schools, who may be misguided and should be allowed to be so misguided if they wish, are doing the State a favour in terms of the amount of money they save taxpayers. The result of the measures recently taken by the Government has been, as the Minister of State will be aware, the moving of several schools from the private to the public sector, again at great cost to the State. As a result of the increase in the pupil-teacher ratio, many schools, including Kilkenny College and St. Patrick's Cathedral grammar school, have moved against their will from one sector to the other at great cost to the State and great inconvenience to themselves.

See this speech in context