Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

The Minister may have forgotten to deal with one matter. I welcome her comments on the question of an independent appeals board not comprising personnel within the Department. I accept fully the professionalism of the people chosen, the high esteem in which are held and their capacity to do the job, but as representatives of the Department of Education and Science, they obviously would have a conflict of interest in terms of their independence and that is why I suggested a mechanism whereby the Minister could amend the Ombudsman for Children Act 2002 to provide this role to him or her, who would be seen as clearly independent in this instance.

While the Minister states that, for instance, if the school has all of its policies, it will be on a winner, the reality is that every school had to possess those policies long before this Bill or before these matters began to arise. Every school that has thought educationally in the context of the prevailing environment possesses all of these policies and I suggest they have been crying out to the Department of Education and Science to give the lead, the indications and the framework on which these policies should be brought forward. There has been delay by respective Ministers down the years. The Minister, Deputy Hanafin, is to be commended on bringing forward the proposals.

The Minister stated that I want to place the balance on the side of the schools, but that is not so. On Second Stage, I clearly welcomed the balance within the legislation. However, the record of the decisions given clearly shows that the only reason that could be found and has been expressed and documented for the Department giving its decisions was non-compliance with procedures, and that has caused concern. I instanced one case of a vocational education committee where it was delayed for one day on the Department's advice and the Department returned the following day upholding the appeal of the child and stating that the VEC had broken the rules on the basis of delaying by that day. When the Department's advice given one day is turned on its head the next and the Department makes the opposite decision, how can there be general acceptance of fairness or balance? It is such cases that cause the problems and concern. One would want to legislate against the like of that ever arising again where mistakes were made, not by the school authorities, boards of management or VEC, but by the Department and accepted as an error on its part.

I hope it would be clear that where schools have abided correctly by each of the procedural steps, taken account of all of the ones highlighted in the legislation under the various headings listed such as reasonableness, nature and scale of persistence, educational interest to other students, safety, health and welfare of teachers, students, etc., and have taken out the relevant policies, the Department would not perform a somersault and make a decision such as that to which I referred. That is the only mechanism. It does not favour school boards of management, teachers and the main body of students. The Minister was very selective in saying that in so far as we were speaking of the students. It was very selective with regard to students. The majority of students in every school want to be educated in a tolerant environment and in co-operation with teachers and management. I want to make it clear that my amendment will affect only the individual students who cause disruption. I do not want to tilt the law on the side of teachers or boards of management because, as I stated on Second Stage, a balance is required. However, a balance will not be achieved if one individual causes disruption among his or her fellow students. I hope the Minister will incorporate my amendments and provide for the independence of appeals boards. I do not see them as independent at present and, despite their capabilities and capacities for fairness, many of those involved in the education sector will never be able to completely discharge their duties if an element of unfairness remains or the Department is seen as having a vested interest.