TEACHERS' UNION OF IRELAND:A SPECIAL provision in equality legislation that allows religious-run schools to discriminate in favour of prospective employees on religious grounds will be examined by the Government, Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn said yesterday.
Teachers’ Union of Ireland president Bernie Ruane had raised the issue of section 37(1) of the Employment Equality Act with Mr Quinn.
In her reply to the Minister following his address to the union’s annual congress in Tralee, she said it was a “draconian” piece of legislation that “clearly discriminates against some of our citizens”.
Mr Quinn said the programme for government agreed between Fine Gael and Labour did “talk about moving in this area”. While he could not anticipate what final action the Government would take on legislation, he did believe it was important to recognise that Ireland was now “more tolerant and inclusive”.
“There is an understandable concern that many people who might contemplate a civil partnership feel that perhaps they can’t do that because of the action that might be taken by patrons of some schools. But I would hope that as we move to complete the Republic and make it pluralist and open and inclusive, that those fears can be allayed.”
However, Mr Quinn rejected calls by the union for the State to save €100 million of taxpayers’ money by ending the practice of paying the salaries of teachers in private, fee-paying schools and colleges and instead investing it in schools in disadvantaged areas.
Ms Ruane said such private schools had been repeatedly shown to be bottom of the table when it came to inclusivity, especially with regard to embracing students with special needs. She challenged Mr Quinn to address what she described as “educational apartheid”.
“Do you not think, Minister, that it is unjust that taxpayers should fund private, fee-paying schools to the tune of €100 million?” she asked, adding that parents had to collect supermarket tokens to buy computers for public schools while the State funded “privileged schools who can afford to build swimming pools and golf courses”.
However, Mr Quinn said the State had historically paid teachers’ salaries in all schools, which had all charged fees until the 1960s, when his predecessor as minister, Donagh O’Malley, proposed the abolition of fees under a voluntary discretionary scheme.
In return for participating in this scheme, some 500 of the 720 post-primary schools in the State received capitation grants to cover their running costs.
However, private, fee-paying schools receive no such grants. He had no plans to change that and stop paying their teachers’ salaries, he said.
In his address to congress, Mr Quinn reiterated that Ireland had to cut expenditure on public services. The State was “akin to being in receivership”.
He defended the Croke Park agreement, saying its core purpose was “to allow us to manage better with less”.
The Government’s recovery plan provides for a net reduction in teacher numbers in 2011 and for consultation with the education partners on how best to achieve a further reduction in teacher payroll costs from 2012.
Department officials are to meet the union in the coming weeks to discuss how best to achieve such savings.