Sir, - Talk about waving a red flag before a badly wounded and frustrated bull! Barbara Johnston, PRO for the Congress of Catholic Secondary Schools Parents' Association accuses teachers of behaving like terrorists (Opinion, March 12th).
What a barmy thing to do, was my first thought. With apologies to the lady for that, I'll just add that if there are some dangerous characters in our schools, they are to be found, not standing alone by the blackboard, but camouflaged among the roomful of students. And what masters of guerrilla warfare are those angel-faced mayhem makers - the bane of a poor teacher's life.
Even in the early 1980s, when I threw in my sweat-soaked towel to save my sanity, it was not unknown for teachers to be attacked in the classroom. And now - when so many teenage students work part-time, and some are lured into drink and drugs - how much harder is it to cope? Obviously, only teachers know. But what fair-minded person will deny that for extreme stress their occupation is way out ahead on its unenviable own?
I wasn't a member of the union Barbara Johnston attacks, but like all teachers and others I feel every sympathy for this year's exam candidates. I wish, though, that rather than castigating our beleaguered teachers, Ms Johnston would address the Minister, Mr Woods. She might urge him to make an initial payment to teachers. Were he to do so, might not his gesture magically get everything back to normal?
A fair settlement is all teachers want. And who is more entitled to one? As Jim Dorney of the TUI has pointed out, teachers sacrificed pay increases in the 1980s on the understanding that they would be recompensed when times were better. They weren't. They feel terribly aggrieved. Who, in similar circumstances, would not?
The Minister looks like a fair man and I suggest that he have a word with Mary Harney. Some time ago, when a pay rise for politicians was being indignantly howled down, our Tanaiste, as always unruffled, quietly reminded the country: "If you pay peanuts, you'll get monkeys." - Yours, etc.,
Brendan Joseph, Dublin 8.