A LONG queue of delegates lined up to attack the Education Bill on the second day of the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland annual convention.
Nearly 30 speakers strongly, and at times angrily, criticised the Bill's proposals to set up regional education boards, give statutory powers to school inspectors, allow students of 16 and over to appeal against school decisions, and make school plans compulsory. They also objected to the absence from the Bill of any mention of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment.
The ASTI president elect, Mr John Hurley, proposed an emergency motion demanding the scrapping of the education boards as extravagant structures which will be wasteful of scarce resources". It also called for the Bill to be amended to get rid of those aspects which reduced schools' autonomy, introduced appeals procedures which interfered with effective school operation and undermined teachers' role and status.
The undermining of that status was a recurrent theme. Mr Hurley quoted the White Paper as describing teachers as internationally recognised for their high calibre and commitment, but then looked in vain for any definition of their professional role in the Bill.
More angrily, Mr Bernard O'Connell from Galway said the voice of the teachers had been "studiously ignored" and "totally marginalised" in the Bill. A year ago they had been similarly hurt and marginalised by the then Programme for Competitiveness and Work package.
Mr Noel Buckley from Tipperary said an outsider who might seed nothing but negativity in the debate would not realise that teachers had "a long historical experience of being under funded and under resourced."
Ms Susie Hall from Dublin said the Minister for Education hind "patronised" the delegates in her, speech by her insistence that under the terms of the Bill they would be consulted, when everyone knew consultation without decision making powers was meaningless.
She had, insulted their intelligence by expecting them to believe that the 10 education boards would cost nothing extra, with all their staff, administration, offices and computers being conjured up "like magic".
Referring to her own school's 20 year saga of being shuttled be tween bureaucrats and architects over a new school roof, she said the boards would "add another layer of frustration to schools already crippled by bureaucracy".
Ms Catherine Fitzpatrick from Mallow warned that the boards' real cost would only be known after they were set up, and that would be too late.
Ms Patricia Rowe from Dublin pointed to the number of times the Bill mentioned the Minister's power to limit boards' spending powers, and queried the need for them if resources were so limited.
Mr Aidan Carroll from Mallow said they would be "jumping off boards for local politicians", which teachers would have to "curry favour with" in order to get jobs, funding and resources.
Ms Amy Talbot from Galway warned of the extraordinary powers the Bill would give school inspectors In its present form, inspectors would be granted "unlimited authority to interfere with the running of schools".
A number of delegates expressed amazement at the clause in the Bill allowing students over 16 to appeal against any decision which would "materially affect" their education. This was "irresponsible" and "totally out of touch with reality", said Mr Joe Campbell of Wexford.
"Of course it will be abused. If we were given the right to question every decision of the principal, wouldn't we use it?"