Pauline O'Reilly (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State. This is the second Commencement matter I have tabled on the Citizens' Assembly on Education, but I have brought the issue up many times with the Minister for Education. As I understand it from the Department of Education, it has referred the matter to the Department of an Taoiseach which is why I have addressed this Commencement matter to that Department. We know from previous citizens' assemblies such as the Citizens' Assembly on Climate Action, in particular, and on abortion, that we have had significant change in this country because citizens have been given all of the information and have sat down and looked at it, engaged in dialogue with each other and come up with recommendations themselves. When it comes to education, I am sure we can all agree that it is one of the most important functions of the State. It is enshrined in our Constitution and has a massive budget.

A quarter of that budget is for special needs education. We need to now go back and ask people if it is delivering for them, in order for us to be able to invest whichever way decide we are going to to invest, but it has to be based on something. I am getting frustrated and I am sure the Minister can hear that. This was a key commitment in the programme for Government, the last citizens' assembly on drugs is over and all of the Departments have been aware for over four years that they are working to a target of doing a citizens' assembly on education. I want to know what the date is and I want to know how it is progressing and if all of the Departments have done their work to underpin this going forward. I would love to also hear what the plans are to include young people and children in the citizens' assembly. It was done to an extent in the Citizens' Assembly on Biodiversity - there was a parallel process - but there is a way in which we can have everyone, no matter what age they are, sitting around the table together to discuss these important matters. Certainly from having spoken to people from within the Department of Education, they would like to see the same thing happen.