Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

One hopes this legislation will be enacted quickly but there must be a realisation that there is an acute shortage of teachers, particularly at primary level, and there is a very large percentage of untrained substitute teachers. That is a difficulty which the Minister for Education and Science must acknowledge and address. Senators Ryan and Fitzgerald and the Minister of State have acknowledged the enthusiasm that exists among national school teachers. I do not know whether it was inadvertent or deliberate but the Minister has dampened enthusiasm by issuing a short-sighted directive on the duration of the school year in the recent past. In addition, the directive he issued prior to last Christmas will be forever etched in the minds of teachers. He totally disregarded the effort, endeavour and commitment of teachers. Inspectors always supported teachers and he has dampened their commitment.

There is a greater need now than ever before for teachers to undertake inservice training but they can quite easily stand back from participating now because they can say it is the Minister's responsibility and he has a policy in this regard. I plead with the Minister of State to convey the message to the Minister that it is time for him to rebuild the bridges he burned because of his attitude. His attitude was coloured by sections of the media, which harped on day in, day out about teachers being out of the classroom. The reason they were not in the classroom was they wanted to enhance their performance by participating in inservice training, which was often arranged on an ad hoc basis by the Department. That was terrible.

If the legislation is to be worthwhile and effective, the Minister must address issues such as this. It is incumbent on him to ensure the legislation gets off on a good footing and to make sure everybody affected by it will accept it. He should support the legislation by making the necessary resources available to allow teachers to implement its provisions. There is no better group to respond to the needs of pupils when the chips are down. However, the Minister cannot expect a return on the legislation while, at the same time, clobbering teachers with abuse.