Coughlan hopeful church may shed some schools

MINISTER FOR Education Mary Coughlan said she hoped to see the Catholic Church divesting itself of some its schools on a trial basis.

She recalled the issue was originally raised by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin in the context of the overall number of primary schools in his Dublin archdiocese.

“I am hopeful that the outcome of the discussions with the Catholic Church will lead to the trialling of divesting arrangements and we can then learn from this,” Ms Coughlan added. “It may be that it is successful in some areas and may not work in others.”

She recognised, she said, that this might not provide the full solution to the future development of school patronage either. But she considered it had the potential to play a major role.

“We may need to think of other approaches that we should take and I am open to hearing suggestions in this regard,” she added.

Her department, she said, had agreed to examine a number of initial locations to see what scope or options might exist for a change of patronage.

“The focus is initially on looking at urban areas where there is a number of Catholic schools and where the population is likely to be sufficient to support a number of schools of diverse type,” she added.

Ms Coughlan said she wished to give an opportunity to the Catholic community to engage on the issue and to come back to her.

“I consider it is very important that this concept is tested to see if it will work, before dismissing it as not being able to work,” she added.

Ms Coughlan was speaking on the issue of diversification of primary school provision.

At the end of the 2½ hour debate, a visibly angry Independent TD Joe Behan complained that he, and fellow Independents Finian McGrath and Maureen O’Sullivan, had not been allocated any time to speak.

The three are former teachers.

The three Independents have been seeking Dáil reform to ensure they are allocated time to contribute to debates.

Leas Cheann Comhairle Brendan Howlin said he would ensure that the office of the Ceann Comhairle and the party whips would hear of this complaint.

Fine Gael spokesman Brian Hayes said the public debate on ownership, control and patronage of schools had been waged on the airwaves and newspapers, but it had effectively taken three years for the Dáil to discuss it.

At “one minute to midnight”, the national parliament was holding its first debate.

“It is not the way we should be doing business,” he added.

Labour’s Ruairi Quinn said that one-third of his Dublin South East constituents were “not Catholics”. He did not support the view, he added, that the phrases “non-Catholic”, “non-national” or “non-believer” were appropriate.

“We are all believers, everyone has a belief system,” he added.

In his part of the Republic, there was now a phenomenon of “compulsory Catholicism” where the church had to ration scarce school places, he said.

The two criteria were a baptismal certificate for the child and a utility bill indicating the parents lived in the community.

Sinn Féin’s Aengus Ó Snodaigh said there was a desperate need for diversity in schools, especially in an Ireland which was growing, to include many different cultures, nationalities and religions.