The courts must have regard to the consequences for the Irish education system and the taxpayer's obligation to fund it when considering the "extremely radical" claim that the State is constitutionally bound to fund a private school based on the Steiner method of education in Co Clare, the High Court was told yesterday.
Not to have regard to the consequences would be to ignore what the framers of the Constitution may or may not have had in mind when setting out the State's obligations in relation to the funding of primary education, Mr Bill Shipsey SC said.
Mr Shipsey, with Ms Blathna Ruane, for the State, was making closing submissions on the 19th day of a constitutional action taken by the Cooleenbridge School, Tuamgraney, Co Clare, which is based on the Steiner method.
The action against the Minister for Education and the State has been taken by Nora O'Shiel, a pupil of the school, suing through her mother, Mrs Margaret Boyle O'Shiel; a number of other pupils and parents of those pupils; and Cooleenbridge Ltd, owner and manager of the school.
In his submission, Mr Shipsey said Article 42 of the Constitution was at the heart of the case. Article 42.4 stipulated: "The State shall provide for free primary education . . . with due regard, however, for the rights of parents especially in the matter of religious and moral formation."
He said the parent plaintiffs in the case were arguing that they had made a choice for their children as to how they should be educated at primary level. They had established a private school for that purpose, owned and managed by the company. They no longer wished to fund the school privately and had applied for State funding.
They maintained the only onus on them was to establish to the satisfaction of the court that what went on in the Cooleenbridge school was primary education.
Mr Shipsey said the State rejected the claim that if the plaintiffs established they provided primary education, the school was entitled to the same financial support as other schools recognised by the State.
The State accepted that it had an obligation to provide "for" free primary education. It was the State's case that it had met this obligation through its funding of the 3,200 national schools and nine established schools. There were at least 15 State-funded national schools within a 12-mile radius of Cooleenbridge.