‘No threat to ethos of schools by minorities’

The threat of five-year-olds of different faiths to a school’s belief systems should not be used as an excuse to allow religious discrimination to continue, TDs and senators were told.

A meeting of the Oireachtas education committee discussed Education Minister Richard Bruton’s School Admissions Bill yesterday, but was dominated by the absence of measures dealing with the ‘baptism barrier’.

Eoin Daly, a constitutional lawyer at NUI Galway and addressing the committee on behalf of lobby group Equate, said the obstacle of religious discrimination was not just an abstract issue. A survey for the organisation found one in five people know someone who baptised their child to help ensure access to a local school.