Workers Solidarity Movement

Press Statement from Dublin INTO Districts

Quinn ‘Review’ not enough – Complete Reversal of DEIS Cuts Needed

Thousands of parents and teachers from disadvantaged schools to protest at Department of Education and Skills against staffing cuts

Campaigners against staffing cuts to DEIS schools have said that the Review ordered by Minister Quinn is a move in the right direction but not enough and that the cuts must be completely reversed.  Teachers and parents from Dublin DEIS schools have announced that they are to continue with their plans for a major protest outside the Department of Education and Skills, Marlborough St., Dublin1 on Thursday 19^th January from 3:30p.m.

Primary school communities in some of the poorer areas of the country have been left reeling as the extent of savage cuts to the numbers of teachers in DEIS primary schools begins to emerge.

In a statement issued after a meeting of the union’s Central Executive Committee (CEC) today (Thursday 17^th November), the Irish National Teachers Organisation has said that the INTO “is not in a position to support the JobBridge initiative” and “will be directing members not to participate in the JobBridge scheme.” The issuing of this directive is a major victory for grassroots organising within the INTO.  When JobBridge was first announced by the government during the summer, and when the Department of Education and Science issued a circular on how it would be applied in schools in September, the union leadership’s first reaction was to refuse to issue a directive.  This despite the fact that it was clear to everyone that JobBridge was simply FAS’s Work Placement Programme (WPP) by a different name.

Minister for Education Ruairi Quinn backed down in mid-June on his threat to amend Section 30 of the Teaching Council Act, which would have had the effect of allowing unqualified personnel to continue to work as teachers in primary school classrooms.  The Minister made his decision less than 48 hours before a protest organised by members of the Irish National Teachers Organisation (INTO) was due to be held.

A motion at the annual Congress of the Irish National Teachers Organisation (INTO) today calling for the “setting up of a policy study group” within the Irish Congress of Trade Unions to “conduct an urgent enquiry into …. the feasibility of the Irish state re-taking into public ownership” Ireland’s Natural Resources has been passed by a unanimous vote - a level of support that took even those who strongly supported the motion by surprize.

This audio consists of 10 brief interviews with public sector strikers made during the national strike on 24th November 2009. Picketers at various locations across Dublin talk of what the strike is about, the effects of the cuts and how their unions organised for the strike.

From before 8a.m. this morning, members of the Irish National Teachers Organisation were on the picket line outside the Department of Education and Science in Dublin’s Marlborough Street, alongside Special Needs Assistant colleagues, members of IMPACT, and workers based in the DES building itself, members of SIPTU, CPSU and PSEU.

This is an audio recording of the '‘Organising The Fightback’' meeting at the 2009 Dublin anarchist bookfair. There were three speakers at the meeting, Gregor Kerr a WSM (and INTO) member, an Executive member of the Civil and Public Services Union (CPSU) and a representative of the Free Education for Everyone (FEE) Campaign.

Organising the Fightback - student & workers perspective from Ireland in 2009 by Workers Solidarity on Mixcloud

Somewhere over 50,000 people took part in the INTO organised march through Dublin this afternoon in protest at the education cuts, The was the culmination of a series of regional marches called by the INTO.

They came from the four corners of Munster and beyond for yesterday’s INTO organised protest march through Cork city. 

The final numbers taking part were huge and clearly the biggest seen in the city for a long, long time. Schools from Dungarvan, Listowel, Skibbereen, Kenmare, Thurles, Limerick, Tralee were present along with a huge showing from Cork City. Union banners present were from all over and included the TUI and the ASTI.