Legislation to end ’baptism barrier’ welcome but key structural issue in education not addressed

Latest: The Educate Together movement has tonight welcomed the announcement the government will bring in legislation to end the so-called ‘baptism barrier’ that allows Catholic primary schools turn away non-Catholic children for enrolment.

Minister Bruton set out that his preference is to remove the capacity for state-funded denominational primary schools, where they are oversubscribed, to use religion as a criteria in admissions process except, in three scenarios:

• where it would not otherwise be possible to maintain the ethos of the school;
• where the school is established by a minority religion, in order to ensure that students of that religion can find a school place in a school of that ethos;
• where the school is established by a minority religion, in order to admit a student of that religion who resides in a community consistently served by that school.

Update 8.30pm: The Educate Together movement has tonight welcomed the announcement the government will bring in legislation to end the so-called ‘baptism barrier’ that allows Catholic primary schools turn away non-Catholic children for enrolment