Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Like the Deputy and other Members of the House, we are all extremely concerned at even one day's interruption to the schooling of our young students, and of course we want to do absolutely everything to avoid this interruption and to avoid any further days of interruption. This is what the Minister, Deputy Bruton, and the Department have been working towards. As the Deputy knows, there has been a huge amount of discussion and talks between the ASTI and the Department, which continued right up to yesterday. The parties agreed that contact will be made tomorrow, with a view to arranging further talks after today's one day strike.

I remind the House that a deal is on offer to the ASTI, which would see pay increases of 15% and 22% for new entrant teachers with further benefits in working conditions and a route to further possible improvements after this through the public pay commission. The INTO and the TUI have been able to accept this. I urge the ASTI to re-engage and look at the deal on the table so these interruptions to our young people's lives as far as their schooling is concerned can be avoided.

With regard to a number of the other points made by the Deputy, equality is at the heart of everything we do and we want to create a new equality for all our people. We have just come from a situation of national bankruptcy, which the previous Government had to deal with. This Government is dealing with the aftermath of this. What we want to be is fair to everyone. We want to be fair to our teachers, An Garda Síochána and other public servants and public sector workers. We want to be fair to the taxpayer and the community. We have put forward a way of doing this, in terms of the current negotiations under way and the unwinding of the emergency legislation that was brought in and which was so necessary. Many people made sacrifices. Our gardaí made sacrifices as did our teachers.

With regard to the equality issue, I ask the Deputy to take a broad view of it. As I said, equality and fairness are at the heart of everything the Government is trying to do, particularly in the area of education where the Minister, Deputy Bruton, is particularly focused on creating better opportunities for people from disadvantaged areas in our school system and in higher education. The recent budget contained measures to deliver on this. Let me go back to the new entrant teachers mentioned by the Deputy. They will see pay rises of between 15% and 22%, between €4,600 and €6,700, for new entrant teachers. Let me conclude by saying negotiations, I hope, will be ongoing tomorrow, and every effort will be made by the Government to ensure the outcome of the negotiations are successful.

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