School patronage

lazygal

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/planned-schools-admissions-bill-a-form-of-micro-management-1.1962057




I don't think he can possibly be right about the constitutional aspect, but it's a common scare tactic these days for people to say that anything they don't agree with is 'unconstitutional' :rolleyes:

Sure Jesus himself wanted everyone to go to different schools, based on how his followers interpreted his teachings. And for girls and boys to go to different schools. And for the state to pick up most of the tab. And for elite groups to get state funding.

recedite

What these schools want is the right to cherry-pick students, by excluding those who are not from the right background. But they also want to receive public funding.

The Constitution does not show a particularly socialist leaning on this, which is not surprising given that it was drawn up in the 1930's by Dev with the assistance of Archbishop J McQuaid.

Art. 44 wrote:

1. The State acknowledges that the primary and natural educator of the child is the Family and guarantees to respect the inalienable right and duty of parents to provide, according to their means, for the religious and moral, intellectual, physical and social education of their children.
2. Parents shall be free to provide this education in their homes or in private schools or in schools recognised or established by the State.
3. 1° The State shall not oblige parents in violation of their conscience and lawful preference to send their children to schools established by the State, or to any particular type of school designated by the State.

Looking at the sentences in bold, it clearly envisages that the elite of society can choose to be educated separately, in private schools, in accordance with their lawful preference and their superior means.

However it also seems to be saying, in paragraphs 1 and 2 there, that if the parents opt to exercise this right, it is their duty to provide for it (pay for it)

I note that the proposed new bill still allows for priority of admission to those of a certain religion, siblings of past and present pupils, and the offspring of staff and board members. Of those three, priority for the siblings of present pupils is the only one I would allow in a fully publicly funded school.

There will always be some people who only want to associate with their own kind. Freedom of association is a basic human right. But it is not proper for private discriminatory clubs to be publicly funded.

Unfortunately those politicians etc. who control the public funding are the very ones who are availing of these kind of schools, and turkeys never vote for Christmas.

Absolam

recedite wrote: »

Looking at the sentences in bold, it clearly envisages that the elite of society can choose to be educated separately, in private schools, in accordance with their lawful preference and their superior means.

Doesn't it envisage (or, in fact, specify) that everyone is entitled to provide education for their children? For instance, it doesn't say anything about 'elite', but it does use the unqualified term 'parents'. So in fact, the very poorest in society can also choose to be educated separately, in private schools, in accordance with their lawful preference and their inferior means, if they want. The fact that rich people can spend as much as they want on educating their children is hardly a social ill that can be laid at the feet of the Constitution.

recedite wrote: »

However it also seems to be saying, in paragraphs 1 and 2 there, that if the parents opt to exercise this right, it is their duty to provide for it (pay for it)

Well, specifically it says that parents have an inalienable right and duty to provide for education according to their means. It doesn't limit that inalienable right and duty depending on how (or whether) they opt to exercise it, and it would seem the State can only infringe on that right "In exceptional cases, where the parents for physical or moral reasons fail in their duty towards their children".

And of course, the State also has a duty to provide for that education:
42.2 The State shall provide for free primary education and shall endeavour to supplement and give reasonable aid to private and corporate educational initiative, and, when the public good requires it, provide other educational facilities or institutions with due regard, however, for the rights of parents, especially in the matter of religious and moral formation.

Absolam

SpaceTime wrote: »

However, we have to always remember that the constitution is only important when it saying something that's inline with conservative, status quo principles. Anything outside of that and 'sure it's only an auld bit of paper'.

Somehow 'sure it's only an auld bit of paper' doesn't seem likely to stand up as an argument before the Supreme Court? Even if the argument isn't inline with conservative, status quo principles.

SpaceTime

Absolam wrote: »

Somehow 'sure it's only an auld bit of paper' doesn't seem likely to stand up as an argument before the Supreme Court? Even if the argument isn't inline with conservative, status quo principles.

I mean in the general way that it's interpreted.

What I mean is in day-to-day implementation of public administration the state wouldn't say overlook the odd abortion, but it's quite happy to turn a blind eye to schools being out of line with the constitution and quite a few other issues.

Yeah, it might react if someone takes a supreme court case, but in the interim the status quo and ignoring that pesky constitution seems to work fine for them.

All I'm saying its that some parts of the constitution are taken more seriously than others by 'the powers that be'. The courts are a different matter entirely.

Absolam

SpaceTime wrote: »

I mean in the general way that it's interpreted.
What I mean is in day-to-day implementation of public administration the state wouldn't say overlook the odd abortion, but it's quite happy to turn a blind eye to schools being out of line with the constitution and quite a few other issues.

So when you say the States general interpretation, what day to day implementation turns a blind eye to what schools being out of line with the constitution? And why do you think, with such interest in the subject, no one has brought that flouting of the Constitution before the Supreme Court?

SpaceTime wrote: »

Yeah, it might react if someone takes a supreme court case, but in the interim the status quo and ignoring that pesky constitution seems to work fine for them.

So where do you think the State has ignored the Constitution? And why do you think it hasn't been challenged for doing so in the Supreme Court?

SpaceTime wrote: »

All I'm saying its that some parts of the constitution are taken more seriously than others by 'the powers that be'. The courts are a different matter entirely.

Which parts do you think are taken less seriously? And which 'powers that be'? Aside from the Courts, which I would say are a fairly significant part of the 'powers that be'.

recedite

Absolam wrote: »

it doesn't say anything about 'elite', but it does use the unqualified term 'parents'. So in fact, the very poorest in society can also choose to be educated separately, in private schools..

Yes, technically the poorest people could set up private schools for themselves, if they had the money to do so. Its a bit of an contradiction though
Don't get me wrong, I'm not going all marxist on this and saying private schools should be banned. I'm saying the constitution envisages both state schools and private education. It says nothing about state funding for the private schools, just that those with the means to attend private schools should not be forced to attend the state schools.

recedite

Absolam wrote: »

Which parts do you think are taken less seriously?

This part for example
"4° Legislation providing State aid for schools shall not discriminate between schools under the management of different religious denominations, nor be such as to affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school."
Its quite common for a religious school to say "We'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately. But sure don't worry about it, there's nothing strange or controversial in the instruction we are giving, its only routine stuff, and anyway it wouldn't be good for your child to be separated from their classmates like that."
The trick is to say it quietly to each parent separately, so they think they are the only one.

lazygal

Schools don't even say it quietly. I know of parents flat out told there is no option for taking children out of class or means to provide alternatives during indoctrination unless the parents organize it. Then you've got time spent outside the school for sacraments, time spent when the priest comes to visit, and time spent on prayers, art and music which a non religious child has to put up with.

Brian Shanahan

recedite wrote: »

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going all marxist on this and saying private schools should be banned.

Even from a hard-hearted conservative point of view (is there any other conservative point of view), looking at the facts objectively, private, exclusionary, schools should be banned, with some actually coming out worse even with these advantages. Once you correct school performances for the wealth and social class of the children's parents, private fee-paying schools with admissions criteria do worse than state schools. And even before adjusting for wealth state school students do better at uni than public school students in the UK.

But then again private schools aren't about academic excellence or instilling a proper education into kids, they're about sheltering the rich away from the rest of us, and giving them a recognisable mark to ensure they hit the top, even when their only work relevant skill is towel folding.

Absolam

recedite wrote: »

I'm saying the constitution envisages both state schools and private education. It says nothing about state funding for the private schools, just that those with the means to attend private schools should not be forced to attend the state schools.

Yes, it envisages both state & private schools, but it's rather misleading to say 'it says nothing about state funding for the private schools', because it also says nothing about state funding for the state schools. In fact it says nothing about funding for any schools, it speaks only to funding (insofar as that's a reasonable expectation of the meaning of 'provide' and 'aid') for education and educational initiatives.
And of course, it actually says nowhere that 'those with the means to attend private schools should not be forced to attend the state schools'. It says that no parents can be obliged to send their children to schools established by the State, or to any particular type of school designated by the State. Not just those with substantial means.

recedite wrote: »

This part for example "4° Legislation providing State aid for schools shall not discriminate between schools under the management of different religious denominations, nor be such as to affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school."
Its quite common for a religious school to say "We'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately.

Are you saying that you think it's quite common for religious schools not to be provided with the resources required in order to implement the States obligation under that part of the constitution? That might very well row in with the evidence that we were previously discussing of the significant underfunding of faith based schools compared to others.
Or are you saying that it's quite common for religious schools to lie to parents of students not taking religious instruction in order to place students in circumstances where they might be 'inadvertently' instructed in religion?

In either case, I don't think that religious schools are part of the 'powers that be' responsible for the day-to-day implementation of public administration of the State that SpaceTime was talking about, so I don't think it answers the question.

However, it would certainly be interesting to ascertain if the DoE is being delinquent in it's responsibility (if not quite not taking its responsibility seriously) to provide for education without an obligation to attend religious instruction, in religious schools.

Absolam

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

But then again private schools aren't about academic excellence or instilling a proper education into kids, they're about sheltering the rich away from the rest of us, and giving them a recognisable mark to ensure they hit the top, even when their only work relevant skill is towel folding.

That's interesting. I'm not certain that a degree in Modern History is an entirely irrelevant qualification for a politician, but you don't think the work skills he acquired during his experience as a political researcher, government special advisor, political campaign worker, political speech writer, & political secretary are relevant to his work as a politician?

SpaceTime

Absolam wrote: »

In either case, I don't think that religious schools are part of the 'powers that be' responsible for the day-to-day implementation of public administration of the State that SpaceTime was talking about, so I don't think it answers the question.

However, it would certainly be interesting to ascertain if the DoE is being delinquent in it's responsibility (if not quite not taking its responsibility seriously) to provide for education without an obligation to attend religious instruction, in religious schools.

Religious schools are providing ~96% of the states' education primary and secondary education services as an outsourced, state funded service.

So to say they're not part of 'the powers that be' is absolutely ridiculous. They are the education system.

The culture at the department is also informed by the fact that almost the entire teaching profession (especially primary) is trained in religious institutions.

So basically you're dealing with a system that's fundamentally extremely religious.

Public administration is being outsourced to private religious organisations and also with very weak oversight. They're even opted out of and exempt from equality legislation that applies to all other public and private sector employers and providers of any publically available goods or services.

It's a very odd sector.

I'm getting very fed up with this nonsense in Ireland that people think that an outsourced state service should be except from any regulation or accountability because its a "charity". You're seeing it in education and you're seeing the budgetary control (of lack of) consequences in health.

State services should be state services. If they're outsourced they need to be heavily regulated, open to all, transparent and fully accountable.

Absolam

SpaceTime wrote: »

Religious schools are providing ~96% of the states' education primary and secondary education services as an outsourced, state funded service.

Well.. the State is only obliged to provide for education. So it's not actually an outsourced service; the State actually does provide the service it is obliged to.

SpaceTime wrote: »

So to say they're not part of 'the powers that be' is absolutely ridiculous. They are the education system.

Then I obviously misunderstood what you meant by the powers that be, responsible for the day-to-day implementation of public administration of the State. Since religious schools don't determine the State educational spend, or the educational curriculum, or where new schools will open, or even the day to administration of the educational system (as distinct from the administration of the individual schools), I find it difficult to imagine what powers they wield over the education system. A bit like bus drivers, who are indeed the public transport system (and may occasionally make rash decisions with regard to their care for passengers), and yet aren't the powers that be of public transport...

SpaceTime wrote: »

The culture at the department is also informed by the fact that almost the entire teaching profession (especially primary) is trained in religious institutions.

That's fairly true, and also fairly true of the whole of Ireland, where the culture is informed by the fact that almost the entire population (or ~96% of those educated here anyway) was educated in religious institutions. Actually, that's probably a higher percentage than the teacher percentage, yet we (obviously) have a very healthy and vocal spirit of engaged anti clericalism if this forum is anything to go by. It seems unlikely that teachers were any more affected by their relentless indoctrination at school than the rest of us?

SpaceTime wrote: »

So basically you're dealing with a system that's fundamentally extremely religious.

Well, possibly. Probably a tad less fundamentally extremely religious than the rest of Ireland as a whole, which is, these days, apparently not terribly fundamentally extremely religious, as far as I can tell? Though we do still have the Angelus...

SpaceTime wrote: »

Public administration is being outsourced to private religious organisations and also with very weak oversight. They're even opted out of and exempt from equality legislation that applies to all other public and private sector employers and providers of any publically available goods or services. It's a very odd sector.

I'm not entirely convinced that public administration is being outspourced; as I said, the State is only obliged to provide for education, not to provide it. So I'm not sure what public administration you think has been outsourced?

SpaceTime wrote: »

I'm getting very fed up with this nonsense in Ireland that people think that an outsourced state service should be except from any regulation or accountability because its a "charity". You're seeing it in education and you're seeing the budgetary control (of lack of) consequences in health.

That's a new one on me. How many schools are registered charities?

SpaceTime wrote: »

State services should be state services. If they're outsourced they need to be heavily regulated, open to all, transparent and fully accountable.

I can't disagree with that. I'd go further; State services should not be outsourced at all. If there is a requirement for the State to provide a service then the State should provide it, full stop.

SpaceTime

The state is only 'obliged' to do what a bunch of religious conservatives decided they'd be obliged to do when the constitution was drafted in 1937.

You're really looking at a snapshot of Ireland as it was almost 80 years ago rather than in 2014.

Most other European countries went through radical overhauls of education after WWII and especially during the 1950s and 60s. Ireland however, just kept the status quo, expanded it and funded it directly with tax payers' money basically without reforming anything.

Bear in mind that the state would have been practically accused of communism if it had tried to rollout any kind of education system in those days. It was certainly lambasted with accusations of all sorts of things when it tried to rollout even relatively rudimentary healthcare systems under the Mother and Child Scheme.

All of this was to do with social control by a private organisation / group of organisations. Whatever way various people like to dress it up, that's what it boils down to.

recedite

Absolam wrote: »

However, it would certainly be interesting to ascertain if the DoE is being delinquent in it's responsibility ...to provide for education without an obligation to attend religious instruction, in religious schools.

It is not the function of DoE to micro-manage the budgets of schools. It is up to the BOM of each school to decide on their own priorities. And letting a child opt out of religious instruction is not a high priority in a lot of schools. There never seems to be a staff shortage problem when the teachers need to go on a lunchbreak, or take a sicky on a Monday morning, or a couple of months maternity leave starting on Sept 1st...

A tight budget is never an excuse to break the law, and the Constitution is pretty high up in terms of law.

If I was driving on bald tyres, and I was stopped by the Gardai, it would be no good saying to them "I'd love to get new tyres, but I just can't afford them at the moment, what with my sky TV subscription being due and all that".

SpaceTime

Ahh it's fine if it's for "religious" reasons like tripple parking outside churches for mass or over looking recording the deaths of 'illegitimate' children or maybe the odd bit of child abduction and international trafficking. Maybe keeping adults as laundry slaves to do your bidding if you felt they sinned and so on.

All completely fine if you're doing it for "religious" reasons, one can only assume based on the total lack of any meaningful prosecutions.

Maybe I'm being a bit harsh but you'd really wonder sometimes. If any other organisations were getting away with this you'd call it "corruption" but I suppose Ireland's deemed it to be "the right kind of corruption" so it's perfectly fine.

Absolam

SpaceTime wrote: »

The state is only 'obliged' to do what a bunch of religious conservatives decided they'd be obliged to do when the constitution was drafted in 1937. You're really looking at a snapshot of Ireland as it was almost 80 years ago rather than in 2014.

That's a bit of a blatant strawman though really, isn't it? Your opinion of why the State is obliged to do what it is in fact obliged to do has nothing to do with your misrepresention of the States obligation to provide for education as outsourcing a state funded service...

SpaceTime wrote: »

Most other European countries went through radical overhauls of education after WWII and especially during the 1950s and 60s. Ireland however, just kept the status quo, expanded it and funded it directly with tax payers' money basically without reforming anything.

Maybe. That doesn't explain why you're claiming the State is outsourcing a service which it's not actually obliged to provide though.

SpaceTime wrote: »

Bear in mind that the state would have been practically accused of communism if it had tried to rollout any kind of education system in those days. It was certainly lambasted with accusations of all sorts of things when it tried to rollout even relatively rudimentary healthcare systems under the Mother and Child Scheme.

So even if they'd wanted to change what they were obliged to provide they couldn't have? Fair enough... it still doesn't really have any bearing on your assertion that religious schools are providing ~96% of the states' education primary and secondary education services as an outsourced, state funded service though?

SpaceTime wrote: »

All of this was to do with social control by a private organisation / group of organisations. Whatever way various people like to dress it up, that's what it boils down to.

Which is fascinating, but still.... hardly relevant to the point you were making?

Absolam

recedite wrote: »

It is not the function of DoE to micro-manage the budgets of schools. It is up to the BOM of each school to decide on their own priorities. And letting a child opt out of religious instruction is not a high priority in a lot of schools. There never seems to be a staff shortage problem when the teachers need to go on a lunchbreak, or take a sicky on a Monday morning, or a couple of months maternity leave starting on Sept 1st...

So, per your assertion that "Its quite common for a religious school to say we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately.", are you saying that the religious schools actually do have the staff to supervise the children and are deliberately lying to parents, or are you saying that they are so incredibly badly managed that that can't stretch their (admittedly 30% less than other schools) resources to cover that supervision?

recedite wrote: »

A tight budget is never an excuse to break the law, and the Constitution is pretty high up in terms of law.

Well, which law is the religious school breaking by not providing supervision for non religious students during religious instruction?

recedite wrote: »

If I was driving on bald tyres, and I was stopped by the Gardai, it would be no good saying to them "I'd love to get new tyres, but I just can't afford them at the moment, what with my sky TV subscription being due and all that".

That's a fun analogy. If you were driving the car in the course of work for a company, would it be any good saying "I have flagged the fault with my employer, who is responsible for the maintenance of company vehicles"? It wouldn't absolve you of all responsibility, but in Road Safety legislation responsibility is shared between the owner and driver. I don't think the Constitution places any obligation on educators to not affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school though; the obligation is firmly on the State.

recedite

Absolam wrote: »

are you saying that the religious schools actually do have the staff to supervise the children and are deliberately lying to parents, or are you saying that they are so incredibly badly managed that that can't stretch their (admittedly 30% less than other schools) resources to cover that supervision?

I'm saying if you haven't got the resources to divide up the class when teaching contentious material, then keep them all together and stick to teaching non-contentious material.

Alternatively, give the public money back to the state, and teach whatever nonsense you like privately. Isn't that what they do at Sunday School?

Absolam wrote: »

..would it be any good saying "I have flagged the fault with my employer, who is responsible for the maintenance of company vehicles"?
It wouldn't absolve you of all responsibility, but in Road Safety legislation responsibility is shared between the owner and driver.

Its funny how people defending religion always point to "the State" when trying to attach blame for some wrong or abuse that has been perpetrated by their religion. The State is the employer, or the State colluded.


But when they are rejecting a job application from a gay teacher, or rejecting a pupil on the basis of their religion (or lack of it) suddenly the State is not the employer and normal equality legislation does not apply.

Absolam wrote: »

I don't think the Constitution places any obligation on educators to not affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school though; the obligation is firmly on the State.

The truth is the state may have some culpability, but the primary blame lies with those who are directly involved.
The culpability for denying a child their constitutional rights falls on those who are denying the right in the first place, ie the school patron and/or the BOM, and secondarily there is a failure by the state to provide sufficient oversight and enforcement.
A plaintiff contesting this would probably list all three parties as defendants, and then see how it turned out in court; the blame might be apportioned.

Absolam

recedite wrote: »

I'm saying if you haven't got the resources to divide up the class when teaching contentious material, then keep them all together and stick to teaching non-contentious material. Alternatively, give the public money back to the state, and teach whatever nonsense you like privately. Isn't that what they do at Sunday School?

So you're saying that they actually don't have the resources then, and when they say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately" they do mean it. So maybe if they did have the extra 30% of funding other schools have, they could do just that?

recedite wrote: »

Its funny how people defending religion always point to "the State" when trying to attach blame for some wrong or abuse that has been perpetrated by their religion. The State is the employer, or the State colluded.

I'm sure it is. But more to the point... does the school have any, actual, legal responsibility to not affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school?

recedite wrote: »

But when they are rejecting a job application from a gay teacher, or rejecting a pupil on the basis of their religion (or lack of it) suddenly the State is not the employer and normal equality legislation does not apply.

So, with regards to the issue actually under discussion, to whom does the legislation apply?

recedite wrote: »

The truth is the state may have some culpability, but the primary blame lies with those who are directly involved.
The culpability for denying a child their constitutional rights falls on those who are denying the right in the first place, ie the school patron and/or the BOM, and secondarily there is a failure by the state to provide sufficient oversight and enforcement.

I can certainly see why you'd choose to blame the school, but I'm more interested in who is actually (as in legally) responsible, and how they do or do not fulfil their responsibility.

recedite wrote: »

A plaintiff contesting this would probably list all three parties as defendants, and then see how it turned out in court; the blame might be apportioned.

I think they' be poorly served by their counsel if they did; unless there's a piece of legislation that allows the State to derogate it's responsibility (and statute cannot override the constitution), the responsibility rests squarely with the State as far as I can see. Even the Supreme Court cannot re-apportion the responsibility.

Hotblack Desiato

Absolam wrote: »

So, per your assertion that "Its quite common for a religious school to say we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately.", are you saying that the religious schools actually do have the staff to supervise the children and are deliberately lying to parents, or are you saying that they are so incredibly badly managed that that can't stretch their (admittedly 30% less than other schools) resources to cover that supervision?

Of course they can facilitate opting out of religion; they simply don't want to.

They'd have to confine religious instruction to a set time (different for each class, no more bible stories passed off as learning 'English') and have an arrangement in place to provide some work for the opting out kids to do while they're sitting in another teacher's room. Not hard at all, but making it easier to opt out of religious instruction is not at all what they want, lest it become 'too' popular.

There is plenty of blame to go around here. In the interest of upholding the constitutional rights of parents and children, the state should change the rules which permit/require religion to permeate other subjects, and should ban discrimination in employment and enrolment in schools receiving state funds.

Absolam

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Of course they can facilitate opting out of religion; they simply don't want to.

I don't think we were discussing opting out of religion; we were discussing whether when religious schools (commonly) say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately" they're lying or not. I'm guessing you think they are lying then?

recedite

Absolam wrote: »

So you're saying that they actually don't have the resources then, and when they say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately" they do mean it. So maybe if they did have the extra 30% of funding other schools have, they could do just that?

I'm saying if they have the money to separate out kids according to religion they are allowed to do that (even though I personally don't like that approach)

If they have not got the money, they should avoid the indoctrination aspect altogether, or else leave it until after school hours and let the priest come in at his own expense and do it.

IMO if religious schools got 30% extra funding, the last thing they would spend it on is facilitating non-believers.

On the contrary, the State has a constitutional obligation to withdraw all funding from such schools, as per Article 44.

I would fight that case myself, except that I would probably be bankrupted in the process, even if I won it. The problem for atheists is that we don't get to receive infinite favours in the afterlife in return for sacrificing ourselves in this life. So we are not generally inclined towards martyrdom.

Legislation providing State aid for schools shall not discriminate between schools under the management of different religious denominations, nor be such as to affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school."

recedite

Here's how it should work;
1. Disgruntled parent of a publicly funded religious school makes a complaint to DoE that their child is being obliged to sit through a "religious instruction" program which they don't believe in, or agree with.

2. DoE contacts the school to remind them that their public funding is conditional on complying with constitutional requirements.

3. School immediately moves the issue from the bottom of their list of priorities to the top.

Here's how it actually works;
Religious body controlling the school announces to anyone who will listen that they would love to do more to help the other children, but they have barely enough money to look after their own. If only the State would send them more money, they might be able to do more to help.

State officials cower and try to avoid the issue.

Hotblack Desiato

Absolam wrote: »

I don't think we were discussing opting out of religion; we were discussing whether when religious schools (commonly) say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately" they're lying or not. I'm guessing you think they are lying then?

Yes, no extra resources are required at all, was my previous post not clear?

Absolam

recedite wrote: »

I'm saying if they have the money to separate out kids according to religion they are allowed to do that (even though I personally don't like that approach) If they have not got the money, they should avoid the indoctrination aspect altogether, or else leave it until after school hours and let the priest come in at his own expense and do it.

Right so, but, when you said that "Its quite common for a religious school to say we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately.", were you saying that the religious schools actually do have the staff to supervise the children and are deliberately lying to parents, or were you saying that they are so incredibly badly managed that that can't stretch their (admittedly 30% less than other schools) resources to cover that supervision?

recedite wrote: »

On the contrary, the State has a constitutional obligation to withdraw all funding from such schools, as per Article 44.

I don't think that's true. Or more specifically, the Constitution definitely doesn't say that the State must withdraw all funding from schools that do not provide alternate supervision during religious instruction.
'Legislation providing State aid for schools shall not be such as to affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school' deals with legislation, not the disbursement of public money.
Now if the article said 'State aid for schools shall not be such as to affect prejudicially the right of any child to attend a school receiving public money without attending religious instruction at that school', and if the schools in question were receiving the same amount of State aid as other schools, you might have the beginnings of an argument.

recedite wrote: »

I would fight that case myself, except that I would probably be bankrupted in the process, even if I won it.

In fairness, I think you probably wouldn't win.

recedite wrote: »

The problem for atheists is that we don't get to receive infinite favours in the afterlife in return for sacrificing ourselves in this life. So we are not generally inclined towards martyrdom.

So, without a deity, there is no purpose to self sacrifice on behalf of the common good? Not a common point of view amongst the more philosophical atheists I would have said.

recedite wrote: »

Here's how it should work;
1. Disgruntled parent of a publicly funded religious school makes a complaint to DoE that their child is being obliged to sit through a "religious instruction" program which they don't believe in, or agree with.
2. DoE contacts the school to remind them that their public funding is conditional on complying with constitutional requirements.
3. School immediately moves the issue from the bottom of their list of priorities to the top.

Except that sort of falls apart at point 2. Maybe it should work another way?

recedite wrote: »

Here's how it actually works;
Religious body controlling the school announces to anyone who will listen that they would love to do more to help the other children, but they have barely enough money to look after their own. If only the State would send them more money, they might be able to do more to help. State officials cower and try to avoid the issue.

That sounds a bit like the State not dealing with it's obligations then, rather than the school...

Absolam

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Yes, no extra resources are required at all, was my previous post not clear?

It was, but I'm so glad you edited it, this is much more polite.
But just to be clear (on this and the preceding post), "Yes, no extra resources are required' is intended to convey "Yes, schools are commonly lying to parents when they say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately", and they actually require no extra resources at all to provide staff to supervise children not attending religious instruction? I ask only for the sake of clarity, you understand.

Hotblack Desiato

It's already perfectly clear. If they had the desire to provide supervision they could very easily do so, no resources are required just the will.

Absolam

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

It's already perfectly clear. If they had the desire to provide supervision they could very easily do so, no resources are required just the will.

Yes, it's perfectly clear that you're making a statement of opinion, but not answering the actual question which was; whether when religious schools (commonly) say "we'd love to let your child do something else in a different classroom, but we just haven't got the staff to supervise him/her, unfortunately" they're lying or not.