Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for her response. I welcomed the Minister's row-back on the need for the junior certificate to continue to be a State certified examination and for 60% of the final examination to be externally assessed. I had been calling for that for more than two years, as had others, but the former Minister, Deputy Quinn, was not in listening mode throughout the three years in which he held the post the Minister now holds. Unfortunately, the situation we now find ourselves in is that the document and what the Minister has announced, which is rowing back the position the former Minister, Deputy Quinn, had adopted, goes back to the original proposals put together by the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, NCCA, which were on the table even before the former Minister, Deputy Quinn, came to office. That has been the contributing factor to us finding ourselves in strike action, having previously been in a situation where there was industrial dispute.

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