Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate on the Bill. I will take up some of the points made by the previous contributor, Deputy Mary Mary Mitchell O'Connor. It is important to highlight the importance of teaching and learning. There is a huge relationship between the two. All of us will our children to learn to the very best of their ability. However, there are good teachers and underperforming teachers. Make no mistake about it - learning will be affected by the quality of the teaching.

I was a teacher for a number of years. I have been a full-time politician for ten years so I am longer in politics than I was teaching. Before that, I was a publican. The greatest satisfaction I got from being a publican was that there is a way to measure one's input and output and getting a return on it. One can check the till in one's pub to see how one has done. If one puts on music, one might do a little better. The same applies to politics in that I can work that bit harder to get those few extra votes. Every five years, or sometimes more often, one gets the opportunity to put oneself to the test.

In teaching, there is a very monotone existence. I found it very frustrating - perhaps it is my genetic make-up - because it was very hard to quantify one's efforts. If I worked very hard one year but did nothing the following one, the cheque - it is not about money - was exactly the same as were the rewards on every level. I found that quenched the desire in me to perform as best I could. I am a very competitive person by nature - I am sure some of my colleagues might attest to this - but in teaching, it is difficult to give it one's all because it is very hard to measure the inputs and the outputs and, by extension, measuring how much satisfaction one gets from the job is always difficult.

There is a reality which must be faced. This Bill goes some way towards doing that, although it does not go as far as I would like. However, it begins an interesting debate on the whole area of education and teacher dismissal. In any walk of life, there must be an active dismissal process. However, it is not only about dismissal; it is equally important there is a reward structure. In my experience as a primary school teacher, regrettably, neither are in existence. It might be slightly different at other levels but certainly at primary school level, it is very unusual to see anybody being dismissed or being rewarded for the extra input they put in. We are all human so over time, the natural reaction is to ask oneself is why should I bother because the person alongside me is not making an effort? We all start to down-skill a little. I am not saying that is universal, but it would certainly be human nature.

The current disciplinary procedure is abysmal. One relies on the boards of management, and they have long been a hobbyhorse of mine. Boards of management do not have the wherewithal to deal with disciplinary issues. It is a very difficult area and it is beset with challenges if one wishes to challenge a teacher and, ultimately, if one was to try to dismiss the teacher. The figures back up what I am saying because they are dismal. It is a very complex area. We must embrace that sort of change and acknowledge the failings in the system. Again, I stress the need for the ability to dismiss teachers but also to reward good teachers, who are a wonderful feature of our education system and who we need to encourage.

I make no bones about it but there is a very hesitant attitude towards reform of any kind in education. It is very difficult to get people to change. Recently, I spoke at the launch of a Teagasc advisory course. I was reared on a farm in Drinagh in west Cork and farming today is utterly unrecognisable from the farming I remember as a young fellow. However, when I quiz my young children in the evening about what they did at school that day, what they tell me is recognisable from the time I was at school 30 years ago. There is a reluctance to engage and we see it across the board, whether in terms of junior certificate reform or the National Council for Special Education proposals for a new model of allocating resources for special needs education. Straightaway, a minority of people, with vested interests and a little mix of an agenda and ignorance, start to stir the pot and put it out that it is a cut or a reduction. I regret that is the case but as long as it is and as long we do not face up to it, unfortunately, the education system we have will be the poorer for it.

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