I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this motion. It is very timely. These are the summer months when parents start to think about how we will we stretch our finances to autumn, get everything that we need to ready and then still maybe take a holiday, organise summer camps, etc. The motion is, as stated, very timely. I thank everyone involved for their work on it. It has been very interesting to listen to the contributions so far. Everybody recognises that there are challenges in the country in the context of poverty. Ultimately, this motion stems from the fact that hundreds of thousands of children in this country are living in poverty. The Department is trying to implement measures to combat that, but there are differing views in terms of where the support is coming from and how effective it is. I will go through a few of the things that I think still present challenges. The capitation grant for schools was increased last year but has still not reached a level which will mean that schools are fully funded. It has not reached the level where it needs to be. In addition, it does not take into consideration the level of inflation. As a result, parents are offsetting the costs that the schools do not have the money to meet. Fundraising is happening, particularly in primary schools. I reiterate what I have said on previous occasions, which is that parents are not fundraisers for schools. They send their children to school and that really should be the end of the transaction. If education is truly free in this country, they should not need to fundraise. However, some parents like to fundraise for things that give schools a bit of icing on the cake but not for the bread-and-butter stuff. There should be no parents' associations, etc., fundraising to pay for the cost of insurance, toilet rolls, which I heard about from a few schools, or anything else that should be covered by the State. There should be no parents coming in to fix a shelf that constantly falls down or a hole in a floorboard because material in a prefab is rotten. That should not happen in our schools. Our schools should be fully functioning, fully kitted out and fully workable. The people who work in schools and the students who attend them should be able to do so in buildings that are modern and fit for purpose. Parents should not be offsetting the costs relating to the upkeep of schools that and schools should not have to wait for an extremely long time to get the buildings they so rightly deserve. Voluntary contributions should be banned outright. The payment of such contributions should not be allowed by any schools. There is an app that parents often have on their phones. There is a payment section in the app, and there will always be a little notification mark in that section to say that there is a payment outstanding. When people click into the section in question, they find details of the voluntary contribution. The word is "voluntary" and so that should not be allowed to feature on any app whatsoever. There should never be reminder letters telling parents they have not paid their contribution fee or the kind of passive one stating, "For those parents who haven't paid..." They should just be banned because the State should fully fund the school. We need to get rid of that and the sooner we do that the better. The issue of hot school meals has been a focus of the education committee for a long time. I introduced my first Bill a number of weeks ago with regard to the nutritional value of hot school meals. That is available because there were children who were hungry coming to school. It was introduced to combat that, to make sure that no child in primary school would be hungry. That needs to be rolled out to all primary schools. It is available to all primary schools but not all of them take it up because of the administrative burden on the principals and not all parents take it up because of the nutritional value. That needs to be rolled out, to be fully functioning and to be nutritious so that every child is able to have a nutritious meal in primary school. I would love to see that rolled out in secondary schools but that is a different day's discussion. The reintroduction of the examination fee six weeks before it had to be paid was an absolute disgrace. If at the time of the budget in October the Government knew that was going to happen, parents should have been notified that it was going to be reintroduced in the springtime. When parents were told, they had six weeks to pay but most people do not have such a flexible budget to allow them to pay the €160 or however much it is. When things are being reintroduced time needs to be factored in for that. There was an increase in the cost of school transport for families. I know the Minister said the numbers look very small but for parents with a number of children and on a tight budget any increase will put them in difficulty. I have mentioned school uniforms several times. Sinn Féin had a motion earlier in the year dealing with school uniforms. I put on the record that I think the uniforms for some children are very challenging. I would probably have a different view as to whether we should impose uniforms on children but again that is for a different day. Circular 0032/2017 has been in existence for almost ten years and in most parts is not enforced. There is no point in issuing a circular if nothing is going to be done about it. I am delighted the Minister has said there will be a working group to review and hopefully strengthen that. I would love if nobody had to spend hundreds of euro on a uniform. There should be iron-on or adhesive logos on a generic uniform that would not cost so much money. The reason we know things are so difficult for parents is that the Minister for Social Protection has said that he is going to give 126,000 families the back-to-school clothing and footwear allowance. That equates to 233,000 children in this country who need support for their clothing and shoes to go back to school. I do not see it as a great achievement that we are supporting them. I see it as an absolute disgrace that such a number of people need that support. I welcome that that funding and support is there for those families but I am still shocked that this affects 233,000 children, which is a lot of children, aged between two and 18. I think it goes up to 22 in some cases. There is a digital divide. The digital divide has been seen from Covid time, in particular. My own project in Ballymun, the anseo school completion programme, provided laptops and broadband. I know people still do not believe me that we provided broadband to families but we did because they did not have broadband at home and that is still the case for families around the country. There is a growing divide even though the Minister is saying that children and young people do not need laptops. However, there is an advantage if their family can buy them one and they can continue their school work at home. It is not good enough to say that schools can make up their minds about that. The Department needs to actually decide and give guidance like it does for other things. The Department needs to say they either do not need it or they need it and if they need it, it needs to provide the support money for that. My next point continues on from the digital divide. Some children with disabilities do not have access to digital devices to help them with their learning in school. Their schools might only be granted one or they might only be able to have access to one or two assessments. That needs to change. Every child who needs digital support for learning needs to get that as a priority and it needs to be available to them. While I do not want to eat into too much more of Deputy Hearne's time, I want to wish everybody on the education committee, the Minister, the Minister of State and those who speak on a regular basis about education a very nice summer. It has been a very difficult year for everybody. It is important to recognise that everybody is trying to work hard. We will keep pushing the Minister and the Department from this side of the Chamber but I hope they have a good break.

Sentiment score: 0.09