Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

Without going through individual contributions I thank the House for the welcome given to the report and the praise for those who put it together. It was a very serious exercise involving all of the stakeholders who participated in a very constructive way and I acknowledge this. I acknowledge the contribution of Senator Averil Power and her recognition of the work I have done. She spoke about the patronage model which developed in 2007 against a background of time and population pressure. It is still a pilot project, as she stressed, and we have yet to see how it will work out. However, it is right at this point in time that in addition to existing patrons the State should have a patron body that is available for development should such development prove to be necessary or required. Out of 3,200 schools we have less than five such schools and there are no more than ten on the stocks, in contrast to Educate Together and the gaelscoilleanna movement which together, as Senator Thomas Byrne stated, have close to 100 schools and is a rapidly growing sector.

In the last round, when patronage for 20 new post-primary schools was open, the Catholic Church did not apply notwithstanding the trumpeting of one particular well-informed correspondent of one of the newspapers who gave out about the fact it did not get any schools. One cannot always be well-informed.

I get the sense that while this is being welcomed by Senators part of my response must be to discuss where we go from here and there are three areas which run in tandem. New school building can be specifically skewed in a way to provide diversity of choice in communities with growing populations. This has been reflected not only by me but by previous incumbents when new school patronage was allocated to complement what was already on the ground.

Senator Mullen is not here but he spoke about the desire of Catholic parents in Ashbourne to have a Catholic school. The Catholic Bishop in Ashbourne has not applied for such a school and I think I am right to state he has not expressed an interest in having another Catholic school in the area.

We can provide for diversity from new build in the new growth areas and are doing that. In the primary sector, that range is being provided predominantly by the gaelscoileanna under An Foras Patrúnachta, by Educate Together and some community national schools.

I propose to discuss the second area in some detail, albeit as briefly as possible and as the information is contained in the report, I will summarise. The Catholic Church, through the Archdiocese of Dublin and 22 bishops in all, indicated it sought help and assistance in trying to identify areas in which it has schools where there probably was a demand for diversity. Thereafter, a total of 47 areas comprising 43 towns and four postal districts in the Dublin area were identified. The indices of potential demand for diversity were expanded on in the report, which included an interesting set of indicators that could be used to anticipate what might be the likely demand for non-denominational or multidenominational education. It cited, for example, the increase in civil marriages and a whole host of other indicators. I note they are simply indicators and any scientific researcher would take them with caution, as they are not direct measurements. I will give an example of what I am talking about and what will be the position when we meet in three or four weeks. Arklow, which is now an outer suburban commuter town to the Dublin area and which has experienced a massive increase of a new, diverse population over the past ten to 15 years is one of the aforementioned 43 towns. At present, the town has seven primary schools, one of which is under Church of Ireland patronage. I believe another is a gaelscoil, as there certainly is a gaelcholáiste in Arklow. The town is quite typical - there are towns like Arklow all over the country - and the suggestion is that of the six remaining primary schools, it then would be for the Catholic community to consider how it would divest itself of one or two of those schools to provide for an Educate Together school, a gaelscoil or perhaps a community national school, as well as Catholic schools.