Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael)
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9. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the steps he will take to progress the establishment of an education ombudsman, as referred to in the agreed programme for Government; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10711/16]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy will be aware, A Programme for a Partnership Government provides that the role and power of an ombudsman for education, to whom a parent could complain and appeal on foot of a decision made by a board of management, will be examined by the relevant Oireachtas committee to ensure its consistency with the need to ensure better local decision-making and accountability to parents.

The programme also provides that the Government will introduce a stronger complaints procedure and charter for parents and commence the fitness to teach provisions of the Teaching Council Act. Both of these commitments are part of a continuum, because having a dedicated ombudsman with a power to deal with parental complaints would be a residual but potentially important function where local resolution has failed. The relevant Oireachtas committee will need to consider both programme commitments together. Work already under way in the Department envisages legislative change to section 28 of the Education Act 1998, and creating an ombudsman with powers to externally review school actions would require new legislation that could be progressed in tandem.

Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister for his response. I appreciate that it will be put before the next Oireachtas education committee, but this has already been discussed at length and quite substantially by the previous Oireachtas education committee, where it received unanimous support from all parties. Every member of the previous committee was supportive of the initiative. I met the Secretary General of the Department and his senior team on this matter during the lifetime of the previous Dáil. I will stop short of saying this is craved by parents who want an avenue. The board of management is a dead bolt at the end of the road, with no further avenue of appeal for parents, and this cannot continue. I am particularly interested to know the views of the Minister and whether he is supportive of the establishment of an ombudsman for education. At present we have an Ombudsman for Children, but this office does not adequately deal with the issues and challenges arising in the Department of Education and Skills.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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My ideas are only in development and I do not want to give personal views. We are committing to a charter for parents and we want to see a stronger complaints procedure. We also want to see schools developing the capacity to deal with these problems. I note that, under section 28, guidelines were to be put in place and agreed with schools for dealing with complaints, but section 28 remained a dead letter and it never happened. Clearly there were problems with the Department getting what would have been a system for resolving this. The Deputy is correcting in stating that there needs to be some response.

Generally, an ombudsman provides a recommendation which does not have the force of law. Would such an ombudsman deal with this issue through a recommendation to a school? The Deputy's Bill may envisage an ombudsman going beyond this and not just dealing with recommendations but making binding decisions. These issues need to be teased out. To a degree I am speaking off the cuff because I do not know enough about this.

Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael)
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I appreciate that the Minister is reading into his brief at present, and that is perfectly understandable. I urge the Minister to give his attention to the matter I have raised. I published the legislation during the lifetime of the previous Dáil. It is quite comprehensive and goes into considerable detail dealing with the various avenues, and it is ready to go to committee. I appeal to the Minister on behalf of those parents who feel aggrieved and have nowhere to go with their grievances. This is the issue I have been championing for the past five years. Parents with a grievance have nowhere to go. The board of management is the final stop and if it states, for example, that one child cannot play with another, there is nowhere for a parent to appeal it. The Department has a hands-off approach, as does the inspectorate. Everybody has a hands-off approach if the board of management - which in many schools is the principal, if we are to call a spade a spade - decides something. If the principal decides something the board of management merely rubber-stamps it. I appreciate the Minister's commitment to pursue the issue and bring it before the education committee as soon as possible.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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As I understand the existing law, the Department does not have the power to instruct schools to follow a particular course of action in regard to individual complaint cases. The Deputy is referring to a gap where there is no appeals mechanism beyond the board of management. How to structure it is a matter that we will have to tease out in committee to see where such a role should fall, how an ombudsman would work and how his or her recommendations would be implemented thereafter. I recognise the sincerity of the Deputy's concern and it is certainly something to which I will give priority attention in the Department.