Laws stand in way of transfer of schools

HOPES for the transfer of schools between patrons could be dashed unless bishops, trustees and the Department of Education can find ways around laws governing disposal of property held in trust.

Representatives of the Catholic bishops and the trustees of almost 2,900 Catholic primary schools raised the difficulties at the opening day of hearings held by the Forum on Patronage and Pluralism in the Primary Sector.

Both groups expressed willingness to help meet the need for more diverse primary school provision and Professor John Coolahan, chairman of the advisory group to the forum, accepted they are not attempting to obstruct that process.

But, he said, it appears the whole process the forum is aiming for — to find ways of allowing for transfer of schools from one patron to another — could be “shanghaied” or “stalemated” unless ways around the problem are found.

Catholic primary schools are generally owned by diocesan or parish trusts, by trustees on behalf of religious orders or lay trusts set up as limited companies with charitable status, with buildings and property held in trust.

But the Association of Trustees of Catholic Schools (ATCS) said the current legal situation makes it impossible for a trust to alienate property in a way that would undermine the trust’s specific purpose.

As well as likely problems getting consent from the Commissioners for Charitable Donations and Bequests, they said trustees are not entitled to lease trust property either, which could make it impossible to lease school buildings to the Minister for Education to be sublet to another patron.

“We’re put in a terrible dilemma that what you want to do might be forbidden to do by law. If that’s a kind of logjam down the road, there’s no point going full steam down the road and hitting it. It needs to be looked at now,” said ATCS chairman Brother Anthony Mark McDonnell.

Prof Coolahan, former head of education at NUI Maynooth, and fellow advisory group members Caroline Hussey and Fionnuala Kilfeather questioned five key primary education stakeholders on their submissions yesterday.

Representatives of the Catholic bishops said they cannot decide matters relating to school property held by trusts but suggested it would be useful for the forum to evaluate the legal parameters and what might be possible.

“Before any parish can dispose of property, whether it’s a school or a field, the parish pastoral council and parish finance committee have to approve it before trustees can consider it. It’s our own variation of a triple-lock,” said Bishop Brendan Kelly of Achonry

“But there’s a willingness there [to divest], once schools and communities can be satisfied that there is a fair and just approach to this,” said Bishop Kelly, who chairs the Catholic bishop’s education council.

Prof Coolahan said all sides could address all these triple locks and find no flexibility is allowed at the end of the process, or the key groups — patrons, trustees and the Department of Education — could try to create flexibilities that would allow schools reflect the different world that we now live in.

“It appears to me that we could talk a great deal about integrated curriculum and everything else but if these obstacles are there at the end, it’s quite likely that very little could shift, depending on attitudes towards it,” he said.