Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I want to acknowledge Senator Ruane’s commitment to and passion around this issue. I am listening and I hear her.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this important debate. The Minister of State is very welcome. We know that two of the key commitments in the programme for Government are to establish citizens’ assemblies on biodiversity and on the local government structures best suited to Dublin.

Notwithstanding the very powerful argument made by Senator Ruane, a debate involving all of the stakeholders around local government structures for Dublin is very important and certainly would have an impact right around the country. I welcome the proposal to run the separate assemblies concurrently, with inaugural meetings planned for April 2022. We know this is the first time that two assemblies will run concurrently and it presents an opportunity to design an operational model that can allow for a greater number of citizens’ assemblies to be run. We have certainly seen their value over the past few years. While at the start I was perhaps not convinced about their value, I absolutely believe in their value now.

We all know that biodiversity is in crisis globally. One million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction, the highest number in our history. The destruction of habitats, pollution, climate change, the illegal wildlife trade and overfishing are all issues that we as a country need to tackle head on. There is no doubt but that we need to see a real and transformative change from a biodiversity perspective.

As for the citizens' assembly on the local government structures best suited to Dublin, a directly elected mayor for Dublin could drive forward transport, planning, investment plans and municipal services and could deal with issues such as drugs in a clear and coherent manner. I acknowledge that there will be 80 members, 67 of whom will be randomly selected from the public living in Dublin city and county and the remaining 12 being councillors. Senator Boyhan raised this matter on the Order of Business. I agree with him that we need to ensure that councillors’ voices are to the fore in this process in order to ensure that the voices of the communities they represent are to the fore. There are excellent councillors all around Dublin from all parties and none, elected by their peers. Their input is valuable and vital to the process and could help to develop a model that could be replicated across the country.

However, as my party spokesperson on education, and someone who is passionate about the transformative power of education, I cannot let the opportunity pass without raising the citizens’ assembly on the future of education. The 2020 programme for Government contained a commitment to hold a citizens’ assembly on the future of education and to ensure that the voices of young people and those being educated are central, which is important.

The idea for the assembly arose at a 2018 symposium in the Burren College of Art, which had creativity in education as its theme. In my view, it is most certainly needed. I have had a number of conversations with Catherine Byrne and Shane Bergin, who are the instigators of this proposal. They are committed to the philosophy and the transformative power of education, and the need to educate our young people to be full citizens of our country and participate in all of its different aspects.There are three crucial issues to discuss for the assembly on education to be a success. We need to begin to think of how we can utilise the citizens' assembly process to transform our education systems, namely, the timing of this assembly, its focus and how it will operate. The Taoiseach suggested in recent comments that the assembly on education will run in parallel with one on drugs. Certain comments suggest that these will commence once the two assemblies that we are talking about today are complete. I and many in the education sector are mindful of the work that will need to be done to establish any assembly's terms of reference. It will be helpful to learn more about exactly when the assembly on education will take place and how its terms of reference will be established. I will push for this within my own party.

At a time when the Department of Education is due to report on reform of the senior cycle and the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, NCCA, is preparing a new curriculum for primary education, a citizens' assembly will provide for a space to ask the bigger questions about what education needs to be and what its goal should be. The past two years have been a huge challenge for everybody in education, whether they are young people, their teachers, their parents or the wider school communities. As we emerge from this challenging space, I believe a citizens' assembly offers us the ideal space to discuss the purposes and process for education in this country. It is time for an honest conversation about education and its value.

How will this operate in practice? The programme for Government states that the voices of young people and those being educated are central but we need to start thinking now of how we can facilitate that and bring the voices of young people into this debate. While I welcome this discussion of citizens' assemblies on biodiversity and on reform of local government structures for Dublin, I believe we need to widen our discussions and allow background work to start on other issues such as education, drugs and a number of others. If we can run two assemblies concurrently, then we can start concurrent preparatory works on citizens' assemblies on education and on drugs.