Jerry Buttimer (Fine Gael)

I will. Perhaps that would be much safer.

I refer to the issue of the contracts of librarians employed in the junior certificate school programme, JCSP, in DEIS schools not only in Cork but throughout the country. Last week, the Tánaiste and Minister for Education and Skills made an insensitive announcement in the national broadcast and print media that school librarian positions would be terminated even though the librarians themselves had not been informed. It is important in the context of the debate on educational disadvantage to raise the issue in the Seanad, to express opposition and to expose the decision for what it is, which is a short-sighted attack on those who are disadvantaged and vulnerable.

We can never allow a situation where the poor man's university is closed in our schools. If we value education, reading and learning and resourcing our schools, libraries must be retained. Forcing school libraries to shut is a short-sighted and poor approach to education. Many schools are participating in the Demonstration Library project, which is a valuable resource for our schools. I will quote a school librarian who says "I work in [he names the school] where our JCSP library is the heartbeat of the school itself and this is not an exaggeration". Many students who have found the discipline and routine of mainstream education difficult and overwhelming and who find it a struggle to keep going have found that funding for the leaving certificate applied programme has been cut. Libraries and librarians offer them a resource and an environment in which they can access books and other educational resources to allow their curiosity and intellect to be developed in a non-competitive and non-threatening way, contrary to mainstream classrooms and examinations. Librarians teach these students who are challenged the discipline of study and the quest for learning and libraries provide support for schools to address literacy issues.

The librarian who wrote to me states, "I taught English to our weakest stream using the library as a classroom and I do not believe it would have been possible to engage these students for six hours per week if we were in an ordinary classroom environment". I am a former teacher and the library is a haven and a harbour for students before school begins and at lunchtime. They can read books and learn to explore the written word. The library provides discipline and support for homework and study. It is an important vehicle for education delivery not only in weak schools but in all schools. The issue affects 25 to 30 schools in disadvantaged areas. Does the Minister of State think it is right, given the current budgetary constraints, that our most vulnerable should be attacked by the Government?