Minister gives group of young protesters the slip as other delegates appeal for quiet life, writes LOUISE HOLDEN
A BREAKAWAY group intent on showing Ruairí Quinn the red card found the Minister for Education a hard man to penalise. About a dozen delegates, calling themselves ASTI Fightback, waved red cards and flanked the door to the convention centre, with two covering the lift.
Delegates returning to the conference room said it felt like “running the gauntlet” as they negotiated their way through. “Sure we might as well listen to him, even if we know what he’s going to say,” said one in response to a request to join the revolution. “We don’t want uproar,” said another.
While the protesters exhorted the mild-mannered delegates to bulk up their walk-out, the nimble Minister took a sneaky right at the top of the stairs and disappeared into the hall through a side door.
One treacherous delegate giggled at the neat dummy as the protesters called “Shame!” to the tail of his disappearing entourage.
Quinn 1, Fightback nil. For now. The group insists they will highlight the gap between themselves (mostly young part-time teachers) and the top table at the ASTI.
The Minister may have dodged the protest but there were a few tackles yet in store. Second-level teachers did not appreciate being thanked for their “no fuss, no drama” acceptance of cuts.
Nor did they welcome being publicly marked on their economics homework – and getting a “must try harder”.
“When I hear appeals at this convention or elsewhere for reversals of budget measures or calls for increased investment in education, it worries me that the gravity of the fiscal crisis is still not fully understood,” he said.
After such a roasting on economics, you’d think the delegates would have been glad of a grind. The Minister obliged with some pointers for the upcoming State exam on Europe. As he extolled the virtues of a Yes vote in the fiscal compact treaty, several cross delegates demanded he stop using their conference as a pro-referendum platform. But the exam is only six weeks away! Clearly losing his audience, Quinn pulled it back with a good one about how teachers had welcomed news of Junior Cert reform. They were rolling in the aisles.
By the end of the speech, after a couple of good news stories on funding for Junior Cert reform (there will be some) and changes to legislation discriminating against gay and lesbian teachers in schools (which the ASTI has fought for for 10 years), the mood was even.
About half the delegates clapped. No fuss. No drama.