Faced with soaring insurance costs, schools are forced to rely on cake sales,race-nights and the like just to make do. With little State support, thingsmay get worse before they get better, writes John Downes

Here is a true story of modern Ireland. In a suburb on the northside of Dublin, one school principal is struggling to make ends meet because of soaring insurance costs and poor Government support for his school. He would like to spend all his time on education matters, but he finds the challenge of making the best of scarce resources takes a huge toll.

"Trying to make sure that we have sufficient funds eats into my time hugely," he says. "It has a huge influence. We try to curtail photocopying, turn off the lights in classrooms, cut down on the number of phone calls. We have huge costs."

Padraic Kavanagh is principal of St David's CBS in Artane, Dublin, but his story is not untypical.

These days the term "free education" should come with a health warning. Increasingly, say principals, rising insurance costs mean that such a concept simply does not exist.

According to George O'Callaghan of the Joint Managerial Body (JMB), which represents the management of all voluntary second-level schools in the State, some of his members have seen their insurance premiums as much as double in recent years, a situation that has been compounded by the rise in heating, lighting and labour costs.

Whereas schools in the community and vocational sector have their insurance costs met by the Department of Education directly, voluntary schools have to pay for insurance for their buildings from the capitation grants they receive from the Department. This currently stands at approximately €266 per pupil, marginally up from a rate of €224, six years ago.

As a result of increased insurance costs, however, hard-pressed school principals are being forced to make up for a short-fall in school finances whatever way they can. Frequently, this involves asking parents for voluntary contributions, or encouraging them to take part in ever-more-inventive school fundraising initiatives, ranging from school walks to cake sales, card nights to raffles.

After a fire in 2000, St David's in Artane was completely renovated and redecorated, according to Kavanagh, leading to a revaluation of the school building for insurance purposes.

"It is not possible any longer for a school like ours to continue to pay its insurance premiums," he says. "I want to plan for the best education of the students, instead, I am putting my planning efforts into the wrong areas, for example paying our oil bill."

"As far as I can see, what the government is depending upon is parents covering the costs. It's a kind of stealth tax. . . if you have to pay any sort of money, it is not public education."

The Minister for Education, Noel Dempsey recently told the Dáil that schools had benefited from a number of increases in the allowances available to them.

Grants such as the support services allowance, which amounts to approximately €127 per pupil on top of capitation fees, and equalisation grants of up to €15,554 per school per year allowed schools considerable flexibility in the use of resources to cater for the needs of their pupils. This was, he said, a preferable approach to putting in place grants for specific initiatives.

However, according to O'Callaghan, while the JMB does not deny its members have received increases in funding, these are completely eroded by the increase in insurance costs, and have failed to keep pace with the rate of inflation.

As a result, the JMB wants to see an increase in capitation grants of €50 per pupil, specifically to deal with rising insurance costs. Such an increase would also allow schools to provide much-needed educational services, he says.

Dr Brendan Lydon of Mount St Michael Secondary School in Claremorris, Co Mayo, is in little doubt about what increased funding for insurance costs would mean to his school. "We were hoping we could get to the end of September or start of October without turning on the heating," he says. "To pay for heating and essential repairs, or any major project, I have to budget and plan. I really have to sit down and think of the costs. €50 extra to me per student would take a great load off my shoulders. It would be absolutely fantastic, at least I would have the insurance covered.

"We would be in a very bad state without the generosity of parents," he adds.

Indeed, all four schools this reporter spoke to stressed how deeply they appreciated the contributions parents and staff make to ensure the school can continue to provide a desirable level of education.

But should parents be forced to meet the shortfall at all? Eleanor Petrie, president of the National Parents' Council (Post-Primary) says that many parents wanting to take an active role in their child's school instead find themselves engaged in fundraising activities.

"You do despair when you have fundraising for basic costs," she says. "Fund-raising just to beef up school coffers is not really a parent's role. So-called free education has never really been free."

As primary educators, she believes, parents should be allowed the opportunity to become part of the school community, getting involved in understanding curriculum development. It is sad, she says, when parents are only seen as a source of possible cash.

The Irish Insurance Federation, for its part, says increased premiums are somewhat inevitable given the fact that the liability insurance sector incurred losses of €56 million last year. Total estimated operating profits for non-life insurance activities in the industry increased to €216.8 million from a €67.2 million loss in the previous 12 months.

Minister Dempsey has also stated that the question of bringing down high insurance premiums is a priority for the Government, while seeming to rule out specific initiatives to deal with the shortfall in funding for schools' insurance premiums.

In the meantime, however, secondary school principals and parents around the State will continue to organise another cake-sale, or another school walk, just to ensure pupils at voluntary secondary schools get the education they deserve.