Make teachers mark exams as part of contract, says Young FG

Second-level teachers should be obliged to correct and supervise exams — which cost the State €30m annually — with no extra remuneration, Young Fine Gael has said.

Some €16m was spent on correcting and the party meeting heard from delegates that teachers facing pay cuts in upcoming budgets could mark exam papers.

The motion calling for mandatory corrections by teachers was narrowly passed at the 120-delegate summer school, now named after the late Dr Garret FitzGerald, in Killarney at the weekend.

Those opposing the motion, among them several teachers, said corrections provided an important income stream for teachers who did not get paid during the summer.

It was among a number of motions concerning education.

The idea of a graduate tax was overwhelmingly passed.

However, a motion calling for state funding of private schools to be retained was defeated.

Education Minister Ruairi Quinn was referred to as “a commie b....” during the lively debate.

Also passed was a motion calling for marijuana to be legalised but “strictly for medicinal purposes” for use by terminally or critically ill patients for pain relief.

The move was “not about rolling up a joint” and legalising cannabis as a recreational drug.

The graduate taxation system was the fairest and most viable means of funding third-level education going forward, the meeting heard.

Standards in Irish universities had dropped, with Trinity and UCD no longer among the world’s top 100 universities, and new ways of funding were needed.

Some 46% of all those going to third level were in receipt of grants and a government loan would be a better system, opponents said.

That elections should be held at weekends was also passed — even if this shift ultimately benefited Sinn Féin, it was suggested.

A seminar on tourism heard calls from MEP Seán Kelly for investment in roads and any other infrastructure no longer needed since the downturn to be put into tourism facilities.