IN A strong attack on the Minister for Education, the TUI president demanded the exercise of accountability by the Department of Education.
The word "accountability" was being thrown at them like confetti, said Ms Alice Prendergast. "It's right, proper and good that the legitimate concerns of parents be taken into account. We demand, however, that the Department of Education exercise accountability by consulting with, and taking into account, the professional concerns of teachers."
She said the Minister's commitment to partnership rang somewhat hollow in the context of the lack of reference to teachers in key, decision making elements of the Education Bill.
Ms Prendergast listed a series of "errors of omission" by Ms Breathnach. "Where is the circular letter on new selection and appointments procedures for teachers in the VECs? Where is the long promised further education authority? Where are the appropriate rates of pay for our members in the PLC sector? Where is the grievance procedure long awaited by our members at third level? Where are the reasonable rates of travel and subsistence for teachers attending in service courses? Where are the in service courses?
She said the Minister's speech read like a TUI manifesto but something was being lost in its translation into practice.
"To equality of access, quality of provision, partnership, accountability and pluralism, we say `Yes, Minister'."
"Equality of access is not apparent to us in section 7 of the Equal Status Bill which facilitates discrimination on religious grounds bin enrolment practices and policies at the very point of access."
The commitments to gender equality, endorsed by the recommendations of the Second Commission on the Status of Women, have also lost their "bias" in translation to the Education Bill, she said.
The failure to provide maintenance grants to students attending PLC courses was an indictment of the Department of Education. "It says a great deal but not a lot about equality of access," she commented.
The commitment to pluralism was also lacing. The divisive community splitting anti secular scrutiny of our private lives in section 37 of the Employment Equality Bill is anything but the embodiment of pluralism."
Quality of provision was none too apparent in the shambles that purported to he in service education, she said.
Teachers had been innovative but the work they had done had been taken for granted.
Addressing the Minister, she said that partnership involved giving as well as taking. "I believe that with respect to productivity we have done all the giving and you have done all the taking."
She called on the Minister to restore pension days lost to TUI members due to dispute action. The report on the commission on school accommodation recommends teacher representation on VECs industrial relations procedures in VECs and protection of existing conditions of service. Ms Prendergast asked the Minister to deliver on these.
The TUI would participate fully and constructively in the working group for a teachers' council, she promised. "But the professional organisation for teachers is primarily their trade union. We want that to continue. We want the existing procedures for dismissal to be fully utilised before there is any talk of deregistration of teachers."
The TUI president said the Minister had told delegates at last year's annual congress that outstanding vacancies in the Dublin Institute of Technology and the regional technical colleges would, be filled. She expressed disappointment that the Minister omitted any reference in her speech to the outstanding dispute in the DIT.