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EDUCATION MINISTER NORMA Foley has said that relationships between schools and local bookshops don’t have to be damaged by the free schoolbooks scheme, which some booksellers say has had adverse effects on business.
It garnered significant criticism from sellers, dozens of whom wrote to the Minister expressing concern about a guideline that requires schools to get quotes from three different shops and choose the cheapest.
The scheme, first introduced for primary schools in 2023 and to be expanded to some secondary school years from this September, aims to reduce financial pressure on parents.
Speaking today, Minister Foley said the Department of Education consulted all stakeholders when implementing the scheme, including publishers and sellers.
The Government has spent €68 million on the scheme this year, but the figure is likely to decrease in the coming years, as schools can reuse some of the textbooks purchased.
Minister Foley said that the scheme is “quite a significant lifting of the burden” of back to school on parents, as it not only covers textbooks and workbooks, but novels, dictionaries and homework journals as well.
She added: “The existing relationship that a school may well have with booksellers or the local book store or whatever, that relationship should continue should they so wish.”
This runs contrary to the understanding among some schools and booksellers.
The Department conducted a review of how primary schools have used the ring-fenced funds, the results of which are due to be published this month. Schools had been asked to acquire quotes from three suppliers and to choose the most cost-effective, and schools randomly selected for the review may be required to prove they did so.
Bookselling Ireland today released a statement calling on the Department to clarify the guidelines and encourage schools to consider factors other than cost, such as sustainability and quality of service.
“Since the Free School Books Scheme was rolled out in April 2023, there have been a number of bookshop closures, including seven closures between October and December 2023,” the representative group said.
“All of these bookshops cited the free school book scheme as a factor in their decision to close.
“Margins on schoolbooks are very slim for bookshops, but the increase in footfall brought by school book sales during the summer months made it worthwhile. With this footfall removed, more bookshop closures are inevitable.”
The Journal revealed last month through a Freedom of Information request that booksellers and other stakeholders have been contacting the minister, Taoiseach and other government figures about the scheme for two years.
“As a former teacher, I welcomed the initiative, but as a schoolbooks family shop owner, I have watched in dismay at how the initiative has been implemented,” one owner of a family-run business said in a letter.
They described how they had had to let eight staff go last summer, as the shop couldn’t compete with larger suppliers. They said that two full-time staff had spent seven weeks completing quotes for schools, only to not be chosen by any.
Another owner said the scheme had created an all-or-nothing industry, where shops have to scale-up quickly to fulfil orders for a whole area or miss out on sales altogether.
It is understood that a national tender for schoolbooks was under consideration by Government at one point, as it would guarantee the lowest possible price.
However, it was decided that this would have been administratively laborious, as millions of books would have had to be distributed by the start of term, and Government thought it would put further strain on small businesses.
Ultimately, Government decided to allow schools to tender for books themselves.
In order to reduce the number of bookshop closures resulting from this scheme, Bookselling Ireland called on the Government to introduce targeted supports that “recognise the cultural impact and importance of physical bookshops”. These include cultural vouchers, such as those used in other EU countries, to encourage young people to visit bookshops.
The relationship between schools and local shops has been shattered. The requirement for 3 quotes and the idea of ‘central procurement’ has completely cut the local shop out of the loop. The same local shop that used to sponsor the school football team in return for a name on the jersey. It’s gone. The relationship with the local shop and local supplier is gone.
@Sean O’Dhubhghaill: I want the government to get the best ” bang” for my tax euros!!!! This’ll ease the pressure on parents AND IF the government want value for money— so be it!
@Sean O’Dhubhghaill: No longer a “Durable relationship”
@Ken Mc Carthy: The local shop would also stump up raffle prizes, employ a few kids in TY for work experience and possibly do the odd ‘bargain’ for the home ec dept. The government might want the best prices, but they don’t always give the best long-term value.
@Sean O’Dhubhghaill: if a book on the curriculum costs ‘X’…… it should cost ‘X’ in Killybegs, arklow, Cashel, baltimore etc you can’t seriously blame the government for looking for ‘best’ price?
@Ken Mc Carthy: do you honestly believe this Ken……and would you like to buy some Enron shares
@Ken Mc Carthy: With the exception of novels and plays, there are no books on a curriculum or syllabus. A teacher or school will choose a book which they believe best reflects the syllabus.
@Patrick Presley: Ouch
@Sean O’Dhubhghaill: Agreed, price and value are not the same thing
@Sean O’Dhubhghaill: I wouldn’t trust someone with the second name “Foley”. Her granda probably owned Foleys School Book store, which has since closed in Dublin. Used to be the place to buy school books (Along with Giuneys on Talbot street for school uniforms. Both closed down now. She’s only trying to get likes for her upcoming election campaign, and to get rid of the guilt.
She did zero for the last 5 years and now she gets a brain fart ……..ah there must be something coming up ? Oh an election yes that’s it.
@James Casey: 100% correct.
The whole system seems to be off (no surprise).
I went to school -40- years ago (!!) on the continent.
We got books from the school and returned them at the end of the year.
Same books were used for for several years.
- Why is there a need for different books every year in Ireland?
- If your local bookshop can only survive by selling the annual school books,
then his business is not viable and it was based on a crooked deal.
There should be absolutely no reason for a new school book edition, whatever the topic, other than for every couple of years.
@Wolfgang Bonow: it’s a racket, like the supply of uniforms.
We got hammered for years on the price of school books, these booksellers have got their 30 pieces of silver several times over,remember when they updated a book by changing 1or 2 pages & you had to buy the latest edition & now the Gravy train is stuck in Treacle they start Whining they showed us struggling Parents No sympathy so why should We.
Ye aren’t meant to turn access to educational texts into a racket.
@Pól Pot: They should be free!
Did I read this right..publishers were lobbying government and government officials
WTF…. what are lobbyists offering and how much of this is actually going on up there.
Sounds rotten..
Free books that are now being bought every year when the previous scheme saw books being reused year on year, saving waste and money.
Why can’t book vouchers just be given to parents to use in whatever shop they please?
Hot lunches for many costing millions but cutting Special Education Supports for the children who need it most.
Most schools in Dublin don’t have enough teachers to meet the needs of the children and substitutes are like hen’s teeth.
What good is a hot lunch and a book if your child can’t read or write and can’t get extra support?
Very disappointed in this Minister. Decisions are all for the media and not at all for the children.
We all witnessed what happened to Foleys Bookshops, and Folio Copy books.
@Susa delrosario: Absolutely. The paper My Lai.
@Pól Pot:
“Ca bhuil do leabhar a D’Pól?” – Muinteor
“Ni lis agum. Ata, nil aon papair agum Muinteor. Na bhionn ar siopa oscailt, dhunta. Ata, bron mor orm” – Pól
Etc…
The ‘business’ of school books has wrung money from hard working parents for years. Caused stress and suffering and sometimes because a few paragraphs were changed in a school book. The indifference of the Department of Education to this was astonishing but maybe there’s a bigger picture that’s carefully hidden from view.
Foleys folly. Join the dots.
A digital world … and here we are talking printed materials to carry around. It seems ridiculous to me.
As long as it is free, who cares of the book lobbies
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