Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of the Labour Party, I strongly the support the campaign by Fórsa and welcome the support of the INTO for the campaign to have a just wage and terms of pay and conditions for school secretaries. In practice, the school secretary is one of the first people that children and parents get to know when a child goes to school. That applies at primary and secondary level. They are a key part of the school community and the culture of the school and they are welcoming to children, especially in the early years, and their parents. They are indispensable to the school leadership team. The Department of Education and Skills, in trying to improve our education system and the opportunities and quality of education available to our children, has made school leadership a key concept. The school secretary is critical to the school leadership team. It is a false economy on the part of the Minister to cavil at upgrading the terms and conditions of the school secretary.

I have been reading the figures on the country's income up to 30 September, which were just published by the Minister for Finance. It will come as good news to the Minister that the economy is doing very well because most workers are getting a pay increase of between 2% and 3% a year, while tax bands and allowances have not expanded. Most workers are paying more taxes, as shown in the income tax receipts declared for the nine months to 30 September. I believe there would be all-party agreement in the House if part of what workers and taxpayers have contributed to the growing tax base for the first nine months of 2019 was devoted to righting the situation of school secretaries. We should pay school secretaries not just a minimum wage but a living wage and more. Their pay should take into account their devotion to their work and productivity and their almost unquantifiable contribution to the social fabric of the school, including the welcome and guidance they provide to people when they arrive with a child in a school about which they know very little.

All of that must be recognised as an incredibly valuable skill and as an asset to all of our children. School secretaries are indispensable to principals, deputy principals, and teachers who have varying responsibilities in school. School secretaries have been key to the changes that have happened in schools in recent decades, such as the mainstreaming of children with disabilities and children on the autism spectrum, whether they are very high-functioning children or children with very big challenges, into primary and secondary schools. We have spoken about that mainstreaming on many occasions and it was the correct decision. The Minister recently recognised this key role of the secretaries in respect of schools managed by education and training boards, ETBs, whether community national schools at primary level or community colleges at second level. He has said that where such a school has more than 700 pupils, it can have two secretaries. That is a very positive move.

The fact that school secretaries do not get holiday pay and have to sign on for the summer months is really wrong. The secretaries who have to sign on welcome the fact that they can do so, but they should not have to. Their terms and conditions should include appropriate holiday pay. They should also be provided with occupational pensions. One of the school secretaries at the launch by Fórsa and the INTO, which I attended, was Maeve Hurrell, who has been a secretary in an Educate Together school for more than 30 years. People like her and Mrs. O'Doherty from Donegal, both of whom are due to retire relatively soon having given their whole working lives to children in their schools, will not have an occupational pension. The Department of Education and Skills and the Government must address this issue as a matter of urgency in next Tuesday's budget. It is likely to cost somewhere between €10 million and €30 million extra a year to immediately bring in a scheme that recognises this issue.

It is no accident that this section of the workforce, which works very hard, has gone unrecognised and has been relatively unorganised. What do those in this section of the workforce have in common? Most of them are women. It is because they are women that it has been easy to disregard and undervalue their skills and the commitment they show to the schools in which they work. I hope that the Minister will have a positive announcement to make in Tuesday's budget. I suggest that he start with €20 million or €30 million a year. In the context of the waste of money for which his Government has been responsible, this is a relatively small allocation. Given Brexit, the situation is obviously very fluid but this amount is not much in light of the extra tax that workers are paying because of the failure to index allowances and in the context of wage increases for most workers in the economy. There is now a surplus flowing into the Exchequer's coffers arising from increased income tax receipts. Justice requires that a significant portion of this surplus - not a huge amount in the overall context, but rather a relatively modest one - be allocated to the plight of the school secretaries.

The Minister must recognise the issues with regard to their working conditions, their holiday pay, and their entitlement to sick leave and an occupational pension scheme. If he does not, his Government is saying that it wants to maintain the practice of large numbers of the workforce receiving minimal pay and conditions with no ancillary benefits or rights. That is a way to impoverish people into their old age. I do not believe that is something the Minister personally wants to do. This budget is an opportunity to set the situation right. I congratulate Fórsa and I congratulate the INTO on its support for Fórsa's campaign.

See this speech in context