Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I urge the Taoiseach to go down to his local second level school at the next opportunity, to walk into the sixth year class and observe the students all wearing masks, with the windows open, to count the number of teachers and students who are out because of the pandemic, and tell them that everything is going back to normal. The Taoiseach knows that if the schools were closed, the Department would find a mechanism to deliver a hybrid leaving certificate. All of the excuses the Taoiseach is trotting out about the junior certificate or the idea that school profiling was going to be essential just do not stand up to any scrutiny. The fact is the Government is dealing with a very conservative Department of Education and is failing to take it on. I implore the Taoiseach to go down to his local second level school and tell the students, with their masks on, the windows open, and the teachers out, that they can just go back to normal. The Government has failed to take on the Department of Education and its conservatism and it has failed the students.

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