Cecilia Keaveney (Fianna Fail)

On the mathematics argument, I would agree with Senator Ormonde that sometimes the brightest people are not necessarily the best teachers because sometimes they are a step ahead and cannot bring themselves down to the level of understanding that someone does not just get how to do something. As a teacher myself, that is no denigration of the teaching profession either.

I also concur with Senator Quinn on last night's debate on the North being very important. I ask the Leader to consider taking my report on how to teach history in areas of recent conflict, which was done for the Council of Europe and endorsed by 47 countries, as a starting point to explore further what we could be doing on getting to know each other to the island of Ireland and developing the critical skills for employees and employers that can evolve from there.

Another point on mathematics is that we keep on nodding our brow to the issue of music and how music is intrinsically related to one's mathematical capacity. I again ask that we look at the role of the arts at preschool and primary school, not as arts subjects but as conduits for opening up a child's ability and leaving him or her much more ready for more difficult situations later in life.

I ask that we have a debate on the NCSE, the National Council for Special Education. There is a review going on nationally. There is not a cut in the provision of services, but schools are finding changes because special needs assistants could well be still in the school but the child has moved on. There is a fundamental need to look at this organisation, which is not long up and running, to see where are the gaps in the provision. These should be the guardian angels of special needs students. At present, sometimes we do not have issues such as health and transport integrated with education, and a discussion about the NCSE would be timely.