Dan Neville (Limerick West, Fine Gael)
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Question 534: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if there is a limit to the number of days that a retired primary teacher can work without their pension being affected. [35215/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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A teacher who has retired on pension may, subsequent to retirement, give further teaching service provided the nature of the pension does not debar a return to employment. Pensions which could debar employment are those awarded because of ill health or under the early retirement scheme for teachers, namely, the three-strand scheme.

Where the teacher's pension is an ill-health pension, a return to teaching could be approved only on production of medical evidence indicating, to the satisfaction of my Department, that a significant improvement in health had occurred. If such an improvement was substantiated, payment of the ill-health pension would cease.

The position in regard to the early retirement scheme for teachers is that teachers who are awarded a pension under strand 1 or strand 2 of that scheme undertake, in accepting the pension, that they will not take up employment as a teacher or lecturer in any school or college funded by my Department. Teachers who retire under strand 3 of that scheme, that is, on the grounds that they are surplus to requirements, may undertake part-time or substitute teaching on a casual or intermittent basis but any more substantial teaching employment, or any other public sector employment which is taken up, would lead to the cessation of the early retirement, strand 3, pension.

Where the nature of the pension does not debar a return to employment, such a return may cause the pension to be abated. Abatement is a standard feature of public service pension schemes and is the mechanism used to ensure that the combined earnings, pension plus pay, do not exceed the up-rated pay on which the pension is based. Abatement will lead to the suspension of the pension in respect of any full week during which a primary teacher is in receipt of pro rata pay. Where the primary teacher, in receipt of pro rata pay, is employed for not more than two days in the week, payment of pension in respect of that week will not be affected. Where the primary teacher, in receipt of pro rata pay, is employed for three or four days in the week, pension for the week will be reduced under the abatement rules. Pension will, of course, be restored in full when the employment ceases.

Where the primary teacher is in receipt of pay at the casual daily rate, pension will not be affected. The maximum period which may attract pay at the casual daily rate is 40 days in the school year.

Arising from recent changes agreed regarding the implementation of the Protection of Employees (Part-time Work) Act, teachers, other than those who are contracted to work for the full duration of the school year, may be employed on a non-casual basis or on a casual basis. A primary teacher who is employed on a non-casual basis will be contracted to work for more than 40 days in the school year. A primary teacher who is employed on a casual basis will be employed without the expectation that he or she will attain 40 days' employment in the school year; if the teacher happens to attain this threshold, he or she will be deemed to be employed, with effect from the 41st day, on a non-casual basis.

Retired teachers who return to teaching on a non-casual basis are eligible to receive pro rata pay, that is, pay based on the rate of incremental salary which they held prior to retirement, together with appropriate pensionable allowances. Primary teachers employed on a casual basis will be paid the casual daily rate.