Joe O'Toole (Independent)

The Minister has done a very good job in fighting for extra primary school teachers. I do not see why it should be stopped now. I demand that the Minister continues it until the end of the road. I do not have time to develop that part of the argument much further.

My next point is on the much-heralded and long-awaited initiative on disadvantage. Reading today's newspapers and listening to the news, children who drop out of school and do not get jobs are making the headlines again. From where do they come? If we walk into the nursery of the nearest maternity hospital, we can pick them out. We know where the problems are. The ball is at the Minister's feet. Everybody wants to work with it. We can see areas and addresses which supply the largest proportion of the prison population and the long-term unemployed and a significant amount of those who go no further in education.

There was a time, not so long ago, when people could leave school without qualifications and walk into certain types of jobs. Those jobs have left this country. Manufacturing industry and those low-level jobs have gone to the Far East or other places. The more menial jobs are done by people who have come to this country and are prepared to do them. Irish people are not prepared to do them. Put it all together, and one sees the entire workplace has moved upwards. We have moved up the food chain and people must have some level of qualification or training in order to progress. I ask the Minister to consider that.

An area I would tie into that is that of apprenticeships which somebody needs to grasp. People should be told that going into apprenticeships is something to which they should look forward. I wish apprenticeships included elements of literature, drama, arts and culture as part of their training in the grand tradition of the likes of Brendan Behan and others so that the Abbey Theatre would be filled with plumbers as well as architects and carpenters or brickies would go to the National Concert Hall as well as graduates. We have lost something in this country in that regard. We must begin at the lowest level — the child beginning school.

Two hours ago outside the gates of the House people were agitating, demonstrating and pleading for help to deal with drugs in their community. This is the same issue, namely, one of education. Racism also comes from a lack of education. I am not saying it is the Minister's fault; it is the fault of us all. It is a cultural issue at which we need to look. Drugs and violence, of which we have never seen so much, tend to occur in the same areas. It is all happening in these areas and these children must live through it.

The real architects of Irish education policy are in Merrion Street. They do not want the Minister to put money into reducing class size. They do not know what this special education issue is all about. They seek to put children into the same school and give them a bit of help here and there. There is an agenda, which I know is not the Minister's, to wind down special schools. There cannot be a system without special education schools. There is a possibility to look at the idea of dual enrolment or of a federation of schools, including mainstream, special education and multi-disciplinary schools, to deal with children with all types of needs and to enable teachers and pupils to interact on one campus. That is a useful suggestion but it needs to be done on a pilot basis. We should examine how it might work. I am always afraid of new initiatives, whatever they are. If they are simply introduced without proper planning, they will not work. However, this suggestion surely merits consideration.

When I reply to the debate, I will deal with issues such as the complexity of the classroom, etc. I have asked that teachers' salaries and awards be addressed in the new national programme. I will pick one example to which I would like the Minister to respond. Yesterday I saw the principal of a school on the south side of Dublin who was dealing with a terrible tragedy and describing how he was trying to explain it to children. It is certainly not easier to explain that tragedy to five to eight year olds than to 15 or 16 year olds as the younger the child, the more difficult it is. However, primary school principals are paid less than their post-primary colleagues. It is an anomaly which is wrong in every way, and I could give 24 examples as to why. I ask the Minister to look at teachers' pay, wipe out that anomaly and recognise the additional pressure of school reports. When I reply to the debate, I will deal with the legislation on special educational needs. I have compiled a memorandum which might be helpful to teachers but the shortened version runs to 11 pages.