The Iona Institute » Tánaiste pledges to make it harder for faith schools to prioritise pupils of faith

Tánaiste Joan Burton has said she will support measures to make it much harder for denominational schools to give admit children of the faith of the school ahead of other children in the event of excess demand for places in their schools.

At present about 20 percent of schools, mostly in Dublin, are over-enrolled.

According to The Irish Independent newspaper, during a speech to party colleagues, Deputy Burton said: “Parents shouldn’t feel compelled to baptise their children just to get a school place.”

A spokesperson for the Labour Party subsequently confirmed that, in addition to a commitment to increasing the number of multi-denominational schools in Ireland, the party is working on an amendment to the Equal Status Act which allows schools to admit children of their own religion first.

The spokesperson said: “We must provide parents and children with access to their local schools, regardless of their beliefs.

“The Labour Party will be proposing an amendment to the Equal Status Acts, so that priority can only be given to school admission on the basis of religious exemptions, where the school can prove that using such a prioritisation is necessary to preserve their ethos.”

The spokesperson further revealed that Education Minister Jan O’Sullivan is compiling the education element to the Labour Party’s election manifesto with all of these factors in mind.

In addition to some 100 multi-denominational schools in Ireland, the Labour Party continues to work for greater divestment of Catholic schools, as proposed by the Forum on Patronage and Pluralism, a body established in 2012 by Labour’s then Minister for Education Ruairi Quinn to examine the primary school sector. It pressed for speedy divestment of schools from Church control, despite the lack of evidence that such a move was desired by a majority of parents in Ireland.

Currently faith schools are allowed to admit children of their own faith first on the grounds that they were established in the first place to serve their own faith community.

There may be constitutional difficulties if this right is too strictly curtailed.