'At the moment, to work in Aldi is a better-paid job than a school caretaker'

Fórsa trade union’s head of education Andy Pike: 'Our members are tired of being ignored and lobbying.'

When teachers retire, they walk away with a public sector pension — but school secretaries and caretakers only get “a bunch of flowers and a bottle of whiskey, if they’re lucky”, a trade union has said.

Fórsa trade union’s head of education Andy Pike told the Oireachtas Education Committee that school secretaries and caretakers have been “taken for granted, undervalued, and ignored both within the schools sector and the political world for far too long”.