Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his response. I am quite disappointed that he has no plans to do that. I have raised this issue with him before. It is an incredibly important and topical issue in my home city of Limerick. The current Limerick area post-primary schools common application system works quite well, as I said to the Minister when we last spoke about this. Some 17 secondary schools and 140 primary schools work together to get the right number of students into each institution. However, it is very distressing for a certain number of pupils who fall through the cracks in the system.

As the Minister is aware, several young students in the city were recently left without a secondary school place despite applying to nine different schools. That left them and their parents in a panicked and worried state. Some kind of safety net must be put in place to ensure that no child receives only rejection letters. It is simply not good enough for parents to be forced to contact their TD or local newspapers in a desperate attempt to get a school place for their child. Although the current system works well for many, I ask the Minister to look into this problem and ensure that no child is left without a place. That is why I specifically mention the issue of feeder schools.

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