Shane Ross (Independent)

I would have thought the ambition should be one each at this stage. It is devastating that we have such limited ambitions for education, and it appears we are being softened up and at the very best we will get no progress, no expansion and no kept promises.

The issue of school buildings is one with which the Minister of State will be familiar. It is totally unacceptable that anybody should have to work in such conditions, not to mention the young people of Ireland who are educated in them. Another issue is that of transparency which would solve the problem, although there is a reluctance to have any transparency for reasons that are quite apparent. Those teachers I met were convinced that there were political shenanigans going on in regard to the priority being given to certain schools and not to others. The politicians were interfering and priority was given to schools which were politically sensitive. It is difficult to ask Fianna Fáil politicians not to do that sort of thing, because it is in their nature to do so, but it is wrong to play around with the lives and education of young people for political advantage. A more transparent system would be more important.

The other area in which the Government has blatantly broken its promise is that of the pupil-teacher ratio. The commitment in the programme for Government was 24 pupils to one teacher in both primary and secondary schools, but approximately 100,000 pupils are still in classes with more than 30 pupils to one teacher. This is unacceptable, but whereas that has not only been breached, the ambition to bring it down has also been lost. Next week we will have a decision that will delay all the commitments the Minister outlined in his speech. Educational professionals, and primary school teachers in particular, are demoralised by the Government's attitude to education, which should get a special place in the budget next week.