Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Adult education tutors have been campaigning for a public service contract with a common, sector-wide incremental payscale for many years. The campaign finally bore fruit when in May of last year the Department of further and higher education published a contract proposal. However, that proposal was full of ambiguity and was not acceptable to the tutors. As was said earlier, they will be outside the gates of the Dáil today. Tutors do the same work as their full-time colleagues in the further education and training sector and they want the same terms and conditions. That is not a big request but is only a mark of respect. As I said, they will be protesting outside the gates today. Will the Government commit to re-engage with the tutors and to provide them with pay parity and fairness in the context of the work they do? Parity is all that they want. What they got last May was full of ambiguity. It was not transparent or fair. They need parity of esteem because they do tremendous work, which we all value.

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