Some Catholic children are being refused enrolment to Catholic schools due to a 2018 schools admissions law, according to an Independent Ireland Councillor.

The Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018 prevents Catholic primary schools from offering places to Catholic children ahead of others in cases of over-enrolment. The change was sometimes described in ideological terms as “banning the baptism barrier”. Other faith schools can admit their own children first evem in the event of over-subscription.

Writing on X, Councillor Bill Clear of Kildare County Council, said one result of the 2018 law is that “Catholic families are being pushed out of Catholic schools by non-Catholics, while those same schools are still expected to uphold a Catholic ethos”.

“That is not fairness. That is policy failure”.

He added: “Faith-based schools are being stripped of the very right that justifies their existence, yet parents who actively support and practise that ethos are left without places for their children”.

He said the legislation was never honestly debated and ideology trumped common sense, with the result that ordinary families are paying the price.

He concluded that “a school’s ethos matters or it doesn’t. You cannot have it both ways”.