Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin North Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Senator Zappone seeks to delete a significant section from the Act. I wish we could do so. I also wish we were not dealing with the existing education system and Constitution or the reality in which we find ourselves. Yesterday, when I met many of the groups represented in the Gallery, I made the point that the education system perpetuates inequality by its very constitution. Since its establishment, the State has abdicated responsibility for education by outsourcing the education system. It was decided to have a State-funded education system, rather than a State education system. Schools were established and the State placed them out for tender and asked patron bodies to oversee the running of them. I do not like this but it is the reality within which we must operate. Unfortunately, whatever manner or means we employ to regulate this area, it will never be perfect and education will never be as equal as we would like it to be.

I meet many deputations who raise the issue of equality in the education system. For example, parents ask why they must baptise children to send them to a local school. I am deeply uncomfortable with the idea of having a number of denominational schools in a given area, with children going into school through different school gates. We consistently separate children on the basis of religion and gender. Moreover, because the education system is fundamentally based on the idea of competition, it is inevitable that children who are more disadvantaged lose out and those who are more advantaged gain.

I fully agree with the approach proposed by Senator Zappone because the current position is unjust. While the Bill focuses primarily on employees, what is the child of a lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, LGBT, couple, a divorcee or a single parent expected to feel in this scenario? I am keenly aware of this issue but what does one do when one is charged with responsibility of legislating within constitutional confines? That is the position in which this Government finds itself and any other Government would find itself. I would love to delete the section, as proposed in the amendment, but I predict that if we were to do so, we would be on the losing side in a case before the High Court or Supreme Court. It is inevitable that a court case will be taken in response to this legislation because that is what people tend to do in these circumstances. This will mean we will be back working off the original section 37, rather than the amended section we are trying to introduce today.

Senator Bacik stated that the mechanism we are trying to insert in the Act would make it almost impossible for any employer to suggest that anyone, on the basis of his or her nature, is undermining anything. By continuing to allow more than 90% of the infrastructure of primary level schools to remain in a religious ethos, we will perpetuate inequality. That is a fundamental reality of the position in which we find ourselves and that position is backed up by the Constitution.

People tell me how wonderful the education system is in Finland and what wonderful literacy statistics it produces. In Finland, there is one school in each school district, which means there are no primary, secondary, boys' or girls' schools. Schools in Finland are like palaces because they reflect the Finnish value system and the beliefs of Finnish people. Regardless of who one meets from the Finnish political system, whether left-wing, right-wing, centre-left, centre-right, far-left or far-right, all of them will tell visiting deputations, and I was a member of one such deputation, that the concept underpinning their education system is equality. Fundamentally, all of them believe in equality. In contrast, the Irish education system is underpinned by patronage and neither the child nor the employee is at its centre. Ideology and the rights of patrons to perpetuate their ethos are at the core of our education system. This approach also impacts on medical institutions.

While we are waiting for a revolution in this area - I will be at the front of it - we must deal with the current constitutional reality. Unfortunately, the constitutional constraints within which we operate mean that the best we can do is raise the bar. Notwithstanding these constraints, what we are doing is no mean achievement. I do not want anyone to conclude that my comments are undermining what the Bill will achieve for people working in the school system or a medical institution who believe they cannot be themselves. I am keenly aware of this issue, having dealt with it myself. While I would love to be in a position to delete section 37, to do so would create an open goal for those who want to do down this agenda and inevitably result in us having to deal with the existing section until we radically overhaul the education system, which could take forever.

The European Union is happy for us to constitute our educate system in any way we wish. This is the system we have and I am trying to operate within it.