Denis Landy (Labour)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House and first wish to acknowledge there was good news for Carrick-on-Suir earlier this week. I commend the Minister for Education and Skills on including a new VEC school for Carrick-on-Suir in the five-year capital programme. The Minister of State, Deputy Kelly, visited Carrick-on-Suir within the past ten days, when he and I discussed this matter, with which he is familiar. The present position, according to correspondence received by Presentation primary school on 2 March, is the school is to lose eight teachers from September 2012 in the event of the proposed cuts going ahead. Four of these teachers were in legacy posts put in place through the giving children an even break scheme, two posts derived from the general allocation model and one post was allocated as part of the English as an additional language scheme. In addition, because of a reduction in numbers, a further teacher will be lost to the school. The school has the highest number of teacher losses of the 15 non-DEIS schools in its category. In 2001, the school was allocated four posts as part of the giving children an even break scheme. When the school applied for DEIS status in 2005, it unfortunately was unsuccessful but the aforementioned four posts remained in place and this position has continued until the present.

Carrick-on-Suir actually went backwards economically during the Celtic tiger period and the benefits of the latter did not reach that town. As a result, when the RAPID programme areas were brought into being, Carrick-on-Suir was designated as an RAPID town because of its levels of disadvantage. The South Tipperary social inclusion report of 2008 was based on the 2006 census and makes reference to deprivation indices. The relative deprivation score for the south east is 3.5 but that for Carrick-on-Suir is minus 13.9, which indicates it is an electoral district with one of the highest levels of disadvantage within the country. The report highlighted the problems of unemployment and high levels of lone parent-headed families. It states that Carrick-on-Suir and district are educationally disadvantaged, with unemployment currently running at 20% within the town.

Another issue within the town of Carrick-on-Suir is the high number of asylum seekers and I note that 120 asylum seekers from 12 different nationalities are based in the Bridgewater House hostel in Carrick-on-Suir. The number of foreign nationals within the area has increased from comprising 2.9% of the population in 2002 to a total of 407 in 2006. As a result, the school currently has an English as an additional language teacher with a class of 24. Despite the class having 24 pupils, this post is due to be extinguished as a result of these cutbacks.

I earnestly ask the Minister of State to consider how a school with 26 teachers will have its complement cut by eight teachers or almost one third. It is not practical to run a school in this way. Both the parents' council and the teaching staff understand and realise there must be some clawback of posts. However, I ask that this would be done in a structured fashion and over a number of years, rather than in one fell swoop. I seek a favourable response in this regard.