Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)

——and their scores in mathematics was at the OECD average. They outperformed students in OECD and European countries where class sizes are lower than in Ireland. It is important that we make that point.

I wish also to deal with unqualified teachers because it is an important issue. The House will be aware that at one point there were approximately 600 such teachers. It is my Department's policy that unqualified personnel should only be employed in exceptional circumstances and when all avenues for recruiting qualified personnel have been exhausted. Unqualified personnel should therefore only be employed for short periods pending the recruitment of fully qualified teachers. I am in the course of sending out a letter again to boards of management pointing that out to them.