Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

It was a poor professional performance on my part not to submit amendments on this section. The provision is so broad as to be clearly open to abuse by principals and boards of management. A psychologist friend of mine tells me that the greatest number of cases she deals with concerning workplace issues involve teachers. That is because principals, in particular, have a huge level of power to hire, fire, demote and withhold promotion. I am not being anti-principal in saying this, but there must be safeguards for teachers. There have been many instances, as I am sure the Minister is aware, of teachers being bullied by principals, other teachers or students. A case in Wicklow some years ago involved two female teachers who were subjected to sexist treatment in an all-boys school on an ongoing basis. When the board of management failed to act, the teachers took a legal case.

There are many ways in which the blame can be placed on teachers for difficult situations in classrooms. Most people do not have a clue how difficult it can be to maintain discipline, particularly in certain areas where students face a range of social and economic difficulties. Often, teachers are struggling to maintain good order without any back-up from school management boards which do not want to know about the difficulties those teachers are facing. A situation can arise where a teacher is not able to cope, as I have seen happen in schools, and will have a queue of students sitting outside his or her office at the end of every school day. Principals do not like to see that and will blame teachers without offering any type of assistance to them in their work.

When it comes to adjudicating on whether there has been poor professional performance or professional misconduct, safeguards should be included which explain exactly what is meant by those terms.

What is the timescale pertaining to this misconduct or performance? Did it go on over a period of time? Was it just one week?

This is very disappointing. When the Teaching Council was set up, I was teaching myself. Everyone thought the council would protect teachers and advance the cause of the teaching profession but it is becoming the exact opposite. It is becoming a vehicle for disciplining and sacking teachers. It has done nothing about the downgrading of teaching. We have two-tier pay systems, with new teachers getting paid 15% less. "Yellow pack" teachers are sitting in staff rooms waiting on subbing work. The council says nothing about that situation. Instead of protecting teachers, most of whom are good, it seems to be concerned solely with picking on teachers and joining in this popular - hatred would be too strong a word - antipathy towards teachers in Ireland. This Bill is jumping on that bandwagon.

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