Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank my good friend and colleague, Senator Tim Lombard, for facilitating me going ahead of him. It is much appreciated. The Minister of State is very welcome to the House. I tabled this Commencement matter for one simple reason, that is, a young chap who is blind and who spoke on the Joe Duffy programme last week. He explained that he had done his Irish oral exam. Obviously, given that he is blind his does not see pictures. Part of the Irish oral exam is to describe pictures as Gaeilge. For a blind person to be asked in any circumstances to describe pictures in any language is not acceptable, but it is completely unacceptable for this to happen in a State examination situation.

I have been in touch with the National Council for the Blind of Ireland to try to get a handle on exactly how and why this is happening. It would appear that there is no consistency around the country. In some areas, special provision is made and a commonsense approach is adopted, but in other situations the rules are rigidly stuck to. That is not acceptable. We need the system to be consistent. We need to have a little bit of respect for a young person who cannot see what he or she is doing.

There is a much bigger question in terms of access to the leaving certificate, which I have spoken about before. The fact that we are one of the few countries in the world that does not provide the likes of the leaving certificate examinations in digital format is completely unacceptable. Were the leaving certificate papers in digital form, not alone would blind and visually impaired people be able to access them through the medium they use, anybody with a print disability would be able to access that material.

In the overall context, we have a long way to go in terms of making the State examinations accessible. On the specific issue of the picture elements of the Irish oral exam, we need an immediate response from the Minister of State.