David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the debate. It is obvious from all the contributions by Members of all parties and none that there is universal acceptance that something needs to be done. There is goodwill on this issue across the House and it is the Minister's job to translate that goodwill into action.

I heard the Minister respond to this issue during Questions on Promised Legislation earlier in the week. He said there have been many Ministers with responsibility for education who have not dealt with this issue and that it has been issue for a long number of years. That is not an excuse for not doing anything; it is all the more reason something should be done.

This is not an anomaly that just needs to be fixed. This is an inherent unfairness where school secretaries are doing exactly the same job under different conditions, different levels of pay and not having the protection of being directly employed by the State which carries with it sick pay, holiday pay and a pension benefit. It is difficult for boards of management that know their secretaries are being treated differently from others. It is an unfairness that can be fixed and something that can be addressed. I am not saying it is a simple fix but there are obvious things that can be done. It is in the gift of the Minister's Department, not in the gift of the rest of us who have made our points. We could all try to score points off each other in terms of who was in government in the past. The reality is the Minister, Deputy McHugh, is in government now. He is the Minister, he can fix this and he has the goodwill of this House to do so. I urge him to fix this as quickly as possible.

I, too, met school secretaries on the picket lines. A very good public meeting on this issue, organised by the Fórsa trade union, took place in Waterford about three months ago. I went along and listened to school secretaries tell their stories. Many of the school secretaries in the room were not affected by this issue and enjoyed better working conditions but they were there in support of and to show solidarity for those who did not enjoy those conditions. If they are prepared to show their solidarity, and many of them came out on the picket lines in support of their colleagues, we have to do our job in this Chamber. The school secretaries have raised the issue, as has the trade union. They have raised concerns that the Department has not really been engaging with them on this issue, as the Minister will know. They want real engagement. We all know the only way this will be resolved is by the trade union and the Department sitting down together with a clear intention of addressing it. I encourage the Minister to do that. I hope all the contributions made here will play their part in making sure we can resolve this issue to the benefit of those school secretaries across the State.

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