A GROUP which manages over 400 secondary schools has called on the Minister for Finance to give priority to the education sector in the budget.
The Joint Managerial Body (JMB) cites recent OECD figures showing that the proportion of gross domestic product spent on education in Ireland has dropped significantly from 5.2 per cent in 1995 to 4.6 per cent in 2005.
The OECD average in 2005 was 5.6 per cent of GDP.
Ferdia Kelly, general secretary of the secondary school grouping, said: "Ireland is ranked in 27th place out of 29 countries when it comes to the amount of GDP per capita invested in each second-level student.
"Only six out of 30 OECD countries have a worse pupil-teacher ratio at second-level than Ireland."
The organisation said the situation was even more severe for the voluntary secondary school sector. The average 400-pupil voluntary secondary school received, he said, €98 a pupil less each year than a comparable community and comprehensive school and €220 a pupil less than a vocational school.
"On top of all of that, voluntary secondary schools have to cope with steep increases in the cost of non-discretionary items such as heat (cost has almost doubled), power, telephone, water, classroom materials and cleaning materials."
It has also called on the Department of Education to provide "equal funding for all schools in the post-primary sector within the next two budgets of 2009 and 2010 in line with the commitment given in the programme for government 2007-2012".
This requires a commitment to an increase in payments to voluntary secondary schools of €98 a pupil a year which requires an additional budgetary allocation of €7.6 million.
