Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I raise the statement of the Minister of State, Deputy Madigan, last week regarding four schools. I think it is fair to say this was a stunt designed to cover up the failures within the Department of Education. The hurt and negative aspersions that have been cast over the four schools have been very damaging. One of the schools, St. Gabriel's National School in Stoneybatter, has a great record and reputation for providing for children with additional needs. This September, it will have eight class teachers and six support teachers, while a special class for those with moderate difficulties was established in 2016. That says a lot about the commitment of the school to pupils with additional needs, yet last week the Minister of State sought to portray it as uncaring and as failing to provide any resource or support to children with additional needs, which could not have been further from the truth.

The truth is that that school has been working for the past year on putting in place a new autism spectrum disorder, ASD, unit for September 2023, and working with the architects engaged by the Department of Education itself with regard to renovating two classrooms, yet that did not seem to matter when a letter was sent from the Department to the archbishop at 7.30 p.m. on Friday, 17 June. You could not have made it up. The email to the archbishop was cc'd to the school. The Department did not even have the grace to send it directly to the school and instead effectively put a gun to its head and said that if it did not engage, its name would be published. The school engaged and replied, yet that did not matter when the Minister of State made her statement last week.

She has done severe damage to schools that are trying really hard, and it is important that any of us who knows those schools speaks up. The school I know, St. Gabriel's, has a great record and reputation and it wants to continue doing that work. The Minister of State needs to get on with her work of ensuring there are more special places, as opposed to seeking to cast blame. I have come to know that St. Gabriel's is putting in a new ASD unit because a preschool will have to leave that school building over the next 12 months and the area will lose a very precious and important preschool facility because it is located within that primary school. It is a complete nonsense to say the school has not been engaging.

Separately, the public sector pay talks have been off the radar for the past two weeks, since their collapse, and we have not heard any meaningful or substantial offer from the Government. We are hearing from public sector workers that they are looking for a pay deal and the Government has not yet come to the table. We need to see it happen.