Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

When I was Minister for Education and Skills, when education and skills were harnessed together, I set a target to make Ireland the best education and skills provider in Europe by 2026. I do not know whether that is still monitored. An important approach to governance is to have such bold ambitions.

Ireland has a lot to be proud of in this context. We achieved the fastest expansion of third-level education anywhere in Europe. We are at the top of the table in mathematics and reading. We have created hubs where the competitive advantage of key sectors is built on skills, and we have displayed new flexibility in respect of supply. Springboard, the human capital initiative and the expansion of new apprenticeships are good examples of progress.

Past success should be no grounds for complacency in the future, however. We have to take note of what we know. Our examination system is caught in a time warp. It is a straitjacket on teaching and learning. Indeed, experts from the OECD described us as creating an education system for second-class robots. Despite the fact that William Butler Yeats is alleged to have said education is not filling a bucket but lighting a fire, it seems we are wedded to the filling of the bucket method of examination. We have underdeveloped on the job, despite the great progress being made in apprenticeships. We still do not have a model that sees employers routinely channelling new opportunities in this area and creates an opportunity for people without contacts in the sector to make a commitment. The area is still not well developed.

Design thinking remains a very poor relation in our education and skills development. We simply do not cultivate enough leadership skills or capacity for innovation in any part of our education system. We have not invested in that. The recent report by the OECD represents a valuable input into this debate because its central message is that, as we enter a major period of transformation across climate, technology, artificial intelligence and demographics, we are not particularly well equipped to take on the challenges. The report notes that skills displacement may affect up to a third of the workforce. It shows that low-skill employment is in sharp decline and that Ireland is not strong on problem-solving capability, despite being tops in some of the more traditional ways of measuring progress. Most seriously, it shows our workplaces need to be much better designed to stimulate the use of skills and cultivate their development. These are really well-made points on where we need to make changes and on bringing people, especially employers, with us, along with enterprise. I do not believe Ireland, by comparison with some European countries, has a tradition of enterprises having that level of commitment. It is understandable why that is the case but we need to recognise it.

Productivity in Irish-owned enterprises is growing at less than 1% per annum, whereas in multinationals it is growing at 6% per annum. Clearly, we have an issue regarding how the very skilled workforce we create from our education system is driving innovation, change and development in the workplace. We need to think long and hard about that.

The four-way classification of how we should address reform is very useful. Regarding supply, we need more rounded skills and more investment in management and leadership. I recall that the McKinsey study shows the single greatest impact we could make in our society would be by investing in management and leadership, which are underdeveloped.

There are many useful suggestions on lifelong learning, better workplaces and better governance. On governance, I would go back to the model we had when I started in the Department of Education and Skills in 2016. We do need to have some bold skills and greater accountability. The message from the OECD is that our system of governance is too dispersed and does not have the leverage hoped for.

I believe it was Albert Einstein who said education is what is left when what you have learned has been forgotten. We should take this to heart because the skills we need relate to team building and problem-solving, not trigonometry and dates in our history. One of the reasons Ireland struggles with some of the major transformative changes it has to embark upon is that we still have the marks of the very siloed thinking that was embedded in our education system. We need to find ways of breaking out of the narrow silos. I commend the Minister of State on introducing this debate to the House and hope this is the start of a serious programme of reform related not only to some of the OECD's proposals but also to wider proposals on how we can have greater leadership, innovation and experimentation in our education system.

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