Mark Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I take on board the Senator's point. I understand the argument she is making. The failing of all governments since the foundation of the State has been that we do not teach our children to be active citizens - all the voluntary organisations do. We know that the parents who bring their children to the scouts and events are already active citizens. Most of us are products of parents who are active citizens - we were taught to be active citizens more or less. It is the same parents who bring their children to the GAA, soccer or youth clubs and other voluntary organisations.

We need to be concerned about the 75% of parents who do not teach their children to be active citizens. They are the parents who do not get up on a Saturday morning and bring their children to a GAA club. So the State must take up that role. The governor of Mountjoy Prison has seen many failed citizens come through the door. I quoted this earlier. We teach our children how to make a living but do not teach them how to live. That is the essence of active citizenship. There is a great opportunity. The Minister has been an excellent Minister in her portfolio to engage with the Department of Education and Skills and say we must stop producing economic units of production and instead start creating active citizens. The only way to do that is to use the education system against itself. We must allocate points for a subject of active citizenship that students will do because it will give them extra points and get them into college. It will teach them all why they should engage in public life and their society and not simply go through the entire - as Pádraic Pearse described it - murder machine and come out as an economic unit of production.

I take on board the Senator's point but I did not want to regurgitate the entire motion again. My point is that these organisations does great work but I am concerned about people who do not have parents who are active citizens as examples, unlike those of us who had such a benefit.