Joe McHugh (Donegal, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

There was a question of whether I should even have been there because I knew what the issues were before I went. I knew a lot of them - the pay equality issue, problems in teacher supply, the price of accommodation in Dublin and the uncertainty facing substitute teachers when they came back. It was an opportunity for me to highlight what we had done in the past few months to set up teacher supply panels for substitute teachers in counties Dublin, Galway, Meath, Kildare and Cork. The most important part - believe it or not - was the engagement that took place after the meeting during the one-to-one discussions. It was an opportunity to acknowledge the work the teachers were doing internationally. They are acting as Irish ambassadors and doing so well in terms of career progression. They are heads of departments, principals and deputy principals. They have a skill set and there was a conversation about how we could value it when they returned. If someone has been a head of a department for four years in the UAE, how can we inform boards of management of how beneficial that experience would be to their schools? In a nutshell, I felt there would be a positive outcome. I got a sense that we needed to have a better communication system between the Department and all of our teachers abroad, not just in the UAE but also in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and all over the world. I see them as a tremendous asset. Like most Irish people who go away, they want to come back home at some stage.

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