At the Fianna Fail National Conference Forum in Tullamore last weekend Cllr. Frankie Keena grasped the opportunity to have a private conversation with the Minister for Education & Science, Mr. Batt O’Keefe, T.D.I have received numerous representations from parents and teachers outlining their concerns to the proposed education cuts in the 2009 Budget and I was only delighted to raise these matters for them with the Minister, said Cllr. Keena.
In justifying the cutbacks the Minister informed me that over the last four years 7,000 new primary school teaching posts were created with thousands of Special Needs Assistance posts. There are also 1,400 language support teachers in place over the last number of years.
He also informed me that there is an increase of approximately 180m euro for capital projects to cover all educational levels in 2009 and also an extra allocation of 300m euro to cover increases in teachers' salaries and pensions bringing their total salary bill to 5.4 billion euro per year. For instance, the top point of the teachers salary scale since 1997 has increased from 32,500 to nearly 62,000 euro today. Also teachers who agree to participate in the supervision substitution scheme will receive an annual payment of 1,789 euro in addition to their normal salary.
An interesting point that he also mentioned with regard to teacher substitution was that primary teachers can take a maximum of 31 uncertified sick leave days in a school year and in Secondary and Community/Comprehensive Schools, teachers can take a maximum of 30 uncertified sick leave days in a school year while in VEC schools the maximum is 7 days.
He informed that the total cost to the taxpayer for uncertified sick leave during 2007/2008 was 45 million euro.
The Minister provided an extra 20 million euro into the capitation grant payment scheme for 2009 where schools can receive a grant for each student enrolled. He feels that this increase in grant will counteract the removal of the school book scheme.
In responding I made the point of the difficulty that schools will face with increase class sizes, difficulty in providing supervision for students who have to travel on school business ( football matches, debating teams, etc.) and also supervision on school property if teachers are not in attendance.
The Minister said that he will leave his door open for the INTO, TUI and ASTI to contact him to have constructive meaningful discussions on the matter to try and come up with options that will fit within the parameters of his budget.
I would hope that the Unions get involved with these discussions as soon as possible, said Cllr. Keena.
Finally as a member of Westmeath VEC and the Board of Management of Athlone Community College I grasped the opportunity to raise the matter of a new school for Athlone Community College. I informed the Minister that the building unit of the Department Of Education & Science recently did a needs analysis for a new school and it was approved by the VEC and also that they have carried out a site visit. I impressed on him the need to urgently move to the next stage on this project. In responding he said that he would investigate and revert back to me as soon as possible, concluded Cllr. Keena.
