Joe McHugh (Donegal, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In the first part of her question the Deputy asked what would happen next. At the end of the first quarter of this year the NCCA will report. I am conscious that it has a decision to make and I do not want to predetermine the outcome. I have met the NCCA, my officials and many individuals and groups on the teaching of history. One of the motivations in having Irish, English and maths as core subjects in the junior certificate programme is that they benefit literacy and numeracy, but no subject is of more benefit to one's literacy than history. It is of benefit to one's research skills and in analytical and critical analysis. The Deputy is correct in pointing out that if fewer students take history at junior certificate level, the potential and propensity to take it at honours level in the leaving certificate examinations will decline. There is a little time to work through the issue. I have also asked for the curriculum to be looked at. Perhaps it could even include stair na teanga, the history of the Irish language, which takes us back 3,500 years and can open a lot of doors in respect of our placenames and who we are as a people. I hope that now in the Decade of Commemorations, the time has come for history to take its rightful place.

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