Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

I am glad to have this opportunity to update the House on the current procedures for the employment of substitute teachers by schools. The recruitment and selection of staff, whether for teaching or other positions in a school, rests with boards of management as the employer. Good practice should involve the checking of recent employment records, qualifications, experience and names of referees. While many substitute teachers have previous experience working in schools and may be known to schools, there is clearly a heightened requirement for vigilance in checking the prior employment record where the person seeking employment is not known to the school or is approaching the school for the first time.

Good practices are warranted in any event, quite apart from the specific issue of safeguarding against any child protection risk. In respect of child protection, the arrangements for vetting of teaching and non-teaching staff are set out in Department circular 0094 of 2006 which issued to all schools in June 2006. The circular is available on the website of the Department of Education and Science. The vetting arrangements were introduced in September 2006 for vetting of new teachers at the time of their initial registration with the Teaching Council, regardless of whether they are likely to enter permanent employment or take up appointments as substitute or part-time teachers. The procedures also apply to prospective employees for posts that involve working with children such as special needs assistants, SNAs, bus drivers, bus escorts to children with special needs, caretakers and other ancillary staff in schools.

As the expansion of service by the Garda vetting unit is rolled out, the Department of Education and Science will consult the relevant education stakeholders on how best to introduce vetting of existing teachers working in any capacity — permanent, part-time or substitute — in the school system and other existing education staff working with children. The circular requires the vetting of any person being appointed to a teaching position, whether permanent, part-time or substitute, who has not been employed in the school system in the previous three years.

Irrespective of the position on vetting by the Garda vetting unit, where facts or information come to a board of management's attention calling into question a person's suitability to work with children, it is a matter for the board to be satisfied that the person is suitable to work in that capacity. This naturally will have to be assessed case by case. The board will have to consider all the circumstances of the case, give due weight to all relevant factors and afford fair procedures to the individual concerned before making a decision.

It is the policy of the Department of Education and Science that unqualified personnel should only be employed in exceptional circumstances and when all avenues for recruiting qualified personnel have been exhausted. It is probably inevitable in such situations that schools must be in a position to have recourse to unqualified personnel. It is essential that reliance on such personnel be restricted and kept to the absolute minimum. The previous Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Mary Hanafin, had indicated the intention to bring forward amending legislation which would set out the limitations upon a school's capacity to engage people other than qualified teachers. The Department of Education and Science is working on the proposed legislation and it is the current Minister's intention to advance this amendment to the Teaching Council Act 2001 as soon as possible.

The Minister, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, has no plans to formalise the use of websites for the sourcing of substitute teachers. Schools, as employers, make their own arrangements for the employment of substitute teachers. Many substitute teachers have previous experience of working in schools and generally would be known to schools. Other schools use the text a sub service operated through the Irish Primary Principals' Network. In all cases there is a need for schools to ensure they have good practices in place for the checking of recent employment records, qualifications, experience and names of referees where a new substitute teacher is not known to the school or is approaching the school for the first time.

I thank the Deputy again for giving me the opportunity to update the House on the position on the employment by schools of substitute teachers.