Towards a Better Future

Chapter Seven: The School System: Equality, Inclusion and Rights
shadow of the recent recession, the need for social, cultural and economic development is very clear.
Education is central to this. Evidence from across the world shows that societies that are more equal
provide better outcomes for their citizens. Education is a core mechanism for the advancement of
equality (or its opposite). Equality is also closely linked to quality in modern educational systems.
Educational outcomes are linked to health outcomes (OECD, 2015, p. 156) so there should not be
a battle for resources between education and health. It is, as previously stated, essential that equality
in education becomes a central focus. To deliver this, the resources must be provided. Increased
investment in early years and other areas of education will involve substantial additional allocations
to education, which can only be achieved through increased taxation (progressive, not regressive).
This issue cannot be dodged and the public need to be prepared for this in a careful and measured
way. In the end, it is about the kind of society we want for our children and ourselves.
To achieve the ambition of a more equal, peaceful and prosperous society, government and civil
society will need to think long-term. We are now, post-Brexit, entering a most uncertain time. At
this remove, it even seems likely that we will once again experience an economic slow-down and
perhaps a further recession. We have seen the impact of austerity measures and cutbacks over the past
eight years on the least well off. We have probably yet to experience the full social impact of these.
If there is another economic downturn, Ireland, as a society will need, even more, to guard against
measures that will create further inequality. On the contrary, as a society, Ireland needs to plan for
the future with a set of twenty-year targets to reduce inequality. This work must begin now and with
the youngest citizens. The work cannot be done by schools and the education system alone. For
example, the elimination of consistent child poverty, and indeed homelessness, would do much to
combat educational disadvantage but this can only be done through a multi-agency approach, and
with government determination, through all departments of state.
There must be a national conversation and consensus on improving the conditions, opportunities
and outcomes of all citizens through all facets of the social and economic structure. The social and
cultural returns will be significant but so too will be the economic returns. There is, thus, a historic
opportunity to make a radical difference to Irish society. In this way Ireland can not only make
some progress on developing a more egalitarian system but it could advance the ambition of the
signatories of the 1916 Proclamation that Ireland would guarantee the ‘religious and civil liberty,
equal rights and equal opportunities of all its citizens’.
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