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

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for selecting this matter which is generating a lot of interest. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Damien English, for taking this matter.

I will outline and confirm my support for the development of a centralised information system for primary schools. However, serious concerns have been raised about the Minister's heavy-handed implementation of the primary schools online database or POD system. She has done little thus far to allay the concerns of parents over the security of sensitive information relating to their children. Some serious issues have been raised by parents and the wider public that their data protection rights and legal protections are being ignored by the Minister.

Is it the Minister's intention to threaten to decrease the capitation grant for schools or increase the pupil-teacher ratio for schools where parents have made the decision not to allow their children's details to be included in the primary online database system? For example, if a small primary school has 20 students and the parents of two students did not allow the information to be provided, would that school lose a teacher as a result?

Serious issues have been raised with regard to the level of security of the database. The Minister has tried to allay any data security concerns by stating that data collected by POD will be encrypted on a central system, with access restricted to approved officials in the Department of Education and Skills. However, the Minister has not addressed issues over the security of individual schools' own computer systems. Since schools will have to collect the data and transfer it to the POD system in the Department, children's details may be kept on unsecured and unencrypted computers in schools. Can the Minister give a guarantee as to who will have access to this highly sensitive data on our children?

We are told that the collection process is secure due to a step-by-step system of transferring the data from schools' computers to the Department. How realistic is the proposed system? The Department expects school staff to transfer this highly sensitive data to the Department of Education using a 17-step process so complex that it has been dubbed by principals as near unusable.

It is questionable whether the POD system is in compliance with the Data Protection Act and unclear whether the Data Protection Commissioner has approved the system. We are told that the Department intends to gather sensitive, private data on all primary school students in the country, to include their racial profile, psychological assessments, special needs, religion, and PPS number and that this information will be stored until the children concerned are at least 30 years of age. I question why that needs to be the case.

The Minister has stated that the Data Protection Commissioner has agreed to the data retention policy. I refer to recent remarks by the commissioner: "[I]t seems to be the case that there's an inadequate explanation of why they need it and why they need to hold it for as long as they are holding it." Has the decision on the retention of this data been made in consultation with the Data Protection Commissioner? Has the commissioner given express approval for the retention of all the details being collected? Is he aware of the Department's circular on this matter?

See this speech in context