Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the Chamber. It is a matter of disappointment to me that neither the Minister for Education and Skills nor one of the Ministers of State at that Department have come here for this debate. I will raise the matter nonetheless in the hope of getting some kind of constructive reply.

As the Labour Party spokesperson on education, I am concerned about the Government's capacity to deal with the relationship between the State and the religious patron bodies when it comes to education. I suspect that the bent of the Department of Education and Skills and the Minister who is in charge of that Department is against the multidenominational model. We have yet to see the baptism barrier legislation. A number of campaigns seeking to establish second level Educate Together schools around the country, particularly in Galway, Kildare and Dublin 13, are getting no support from the Department. A departmental circular that was issued last week, and about which the Minister has spoken, will lead to changes in religious instruction in a number of schools. For some reason, the new circular does not cover all schools even though students have a constitutional right not to partake in religious instruction. Religious orders that are seeking to sell off lands at a number of schools have threatened to disband boards of management that have the temerity to resist the sale of such lands or to ask the Minister to disband them. Along with Councillor Deirdre Kingston, I am dealing with the particular case of Clonkeen College at the moment.

The relationship between the State and the education system, which is effectively run by patron bodies, is affecting a plethora of issues. The State should be willing to use its power, for the good of pupils and the people in general, to support a model of education that is outside religious influence. Five new Educate Together primary schools in New Ross, Trim, Tuam, Tramore and Castlebar have been told by the Department that they should have restricted enrolments of just 13 pupils from next September. When the Labour Party was in government, it went out of its way to petition people and parent bodies in various parts of the country for the first time to ascertain the level of interest in different models of education. Despite much scepticism, we discovered that there is a huge level of interest throughout the country in a different model of education that is not under religious influence. Five schools that were established at that time are now being told by the Department that they must have restricted enrolment from next September. What is the thought process behind that decision? Why have these schools been singled out? Is it mere coincidence that they all happen to be Educate Together schools?

Perhaps this and all the other things I have mentioned - the baptism barrier, the circular on religious instruction, the failure to support campaigns seeking to establish second level Educate Together schools and the threat from religious orders to disband boards of management if they stand in the way of the sale of school lands - are in line with the conservative mindset of a Department that has met the conservative mindset of the Minister. On this issue, will anybody from the Government genuinely say that the Department of Education and Skills under the tenure of the Minister, Deputy Bruton, is going to defend in any way the right of parents to have their children educated under the patronage of a multidenominational patron body? I would be interested to hear the Minister of State's response to that question so that we can toss this issue around and debate it further.