Joe Carey (Clare, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this debate. I welcome the establishment of the new Department. I wish the Minister with responsibility for higher education, Deputy Harris, and the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, well in the new Department.

I wish to compliment all our teachers throughout our educational system, whether in primary, secondary or third level, on how they managed to convert from a classroom scene to a digital format in what was literally a matter of days. I wish to compliment the many principals and their staff. They spent most of the summer converting their schools into a safer environment for pupils and staff to enable their return during the past week.

I wish to also compliment the parents in converting to new technology. I can say as a father of two schoolgoing children that there is a greater appreciation of the work teachers do. The use of this new system of teaching with broadband has highlighted the weaknesses of our broadband network throughout our country and County Clare. A family with two children and parents working from home puts strain on the broadband capacity, if they have broadband at all. This pandemic has shown us that we need to accelerate the national broadband plan and possibly broaden capacity as well. We also need to conduct an audit of all our schools and educational institutions to ensure they are provided with adequate bandwidth.

I want to raise two issues that have been specifically raised with me by constituents in County Clare. The first relates to people with special needs who are 18 years old or older and who have, or are seeking, a place in sheltered workshops, sheltered employment, training centres or other suitable placements. This has always been a difficult period for those with special needs as they transfer from full-time second level education to a suitable place in one of these centres. Some of these centres are either closed or operating with restricted capacity. I call on the Minister to make special provision for these centres to accommodate as many as is safely possible. I remind the Minister that many of these pupils and trainees have been in virtual lockdown since the middle of March with their carers. Both need respite as soon as possible.

The second issue is that of apprentices in the aviation industry, especially those based in the Shannon region. The aviation industry has been a drastic casualty of this pandemic. A significant number of aviation-related companies are based around Shannon Airport. In the normal course of events they would recruit a significant number of apprentices at this time of the year. My concern is that there are few, if any, apprenticeships being offered at this time because of the pandemic. These apprenticeships are eagerly sought and normally provide a lifetime of employment anywhere in the world. I accept it is unlikely that there will be many places offered this year, if any, but I call on the Minister to examine the possibility of offering incentives in the coming years to these companies to recruit additional apprentices to make up for the shortfall this year.

The Minister might come back to me on those issues.

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