Greg Daly
Minister for Education Richard Bruton Proposals to bar oversubscribed Catholic schools from prioritising admissions based on religious grounds are untenable and make no legal sense, a leading expert on the Irish Constitution has said.
Minister for Education Richard Bruton last week announced plans to deny Church-owned primary schools the right to include religion as a selection criterion when oversubscribed, stating that oversubscribed schools owned by other faith communities could continue to do so. It is understood that such a move would require a change to the Equal Status Act.
However, UCC constitutional law lecturer Dr Seán Ó Conaill has questioned the constitutionality of the proposal, saying that while Minister Bruton could be arguing that this was a reasonable way to address a historical imbalance, “that doesn’t justify picking out one religion”.
Contesting the legitimacy of discriminating against one religious group by singling it out as being forbidden from selecting pupils on religious grounds, Dr Ó Conaill said the minister’s proposal was “a very simple populist play”.
Sense
“It doesn’t make any legal sense, but it makes plenty of political sense,” he said, noting how the minister’s focus on Church-owned schools was “an untenable solution” that could not be justified. “It’s too weak, it’s too out there,” he continued. “It’s saying, well the other schools are fine but I’m going after the Catholic schools, without any real justification.”
Dr Ó Conaill added that the supposed ‘baptism barrier’ has become a ‘boogie man’ that is spoken about as though its removal would solve the problem of there not being sufficient places in schools in a small number of areas.
“It’s a nonsense,” he said, continuing, “The notion of a ‘baptism barrier’ is one of the great frauds of our time.”
“If they get rid of it, it won’t solve anything,” he explained, “because it’s very simple supply and demand. There’s more demand than there is supply, it doesn’t matter what denomination it is, there’s just not.”
Figures compiled by the Catholic Primary Schools Management Association indicate that no children are ever denied places in Church-owned schools solely on the grounds of religion and that fewer than one child in 300 is refused a place on grounds that include religion.