The Progressive Labour Party yesterday outlined its commitment to public education and pledged to ring-fence its education budget should it come to power.

The party said any money allocated to the education department would stay in the department.

The opposition party repeated its promises, including the phasing out of middle schools — a recommendation left over from the 2010 Hopkins Report — to include wi-fi and adequate technology in schools, to improve the safety and infrastructure of school buildings and to focus on academics in tandem with the trades, business, sports and the arts.

Shadow education minister Diallo Rabain repeated the party’s commitment to partially fund tuition for students at Bermuda College, but said: “I am not saying that it will be free, but enrolment at the college will soon be a PLP priority.”

While Mr Rabain pledged to dedicate “adequate and appropriate funding for Bermuda’s public education system,” he said he was not in a position to provide specifics on the estimated costs of such plans or where those costs would come from.

When pushed, he told The Royal Gazette: “I can’t get into, at this point, all of the particulars of those things, but we can give assurances to the people of Bermuda that the PLP will do what needs to be done to ensure that our schools are adequately funded.”

Mr Rabain listed well-documented criticisms about the school system under the OBA, including mould and insect infestations and crumbling infrastructure in school buildings, changes of education minister “almost annually”, teachers forking out for supplies and budget cuts. He said: “Governing is about priorities.”

Asked whether the problem with school infrastructure had started under the OBA, Mr Rabain said: “The UBP, the PLP and the OBA have not done a good job in education and that also includes building infrastructure.

“Moving forward, we recognise this and we will put things in place to ensure that our buildings are not only safe for our students to attend, but they will be monitored on a regular basis, with reports published to say that they are safe.”

And while Mr Rabain said he welcomed the School Reorganisation Report into primary school infrastructure commissioned by former OBA education minister Wayne Scott, he said it “did not go far enough”.

“It only covered primary schools,” he said. “A comprehensive inspection needs to take place and a policy put in place to ensure they are inspected on an annual basis, that they are healthy and safe.”

St David’s candidate, former education minister and teacher Lovitta Foggo, promised to be responsive to the needs of the community.

She said: “The PLP is listening, but we will not do that without the help of parents. We will make sure that teachers are involved and we will do it in conjunction with the Bermuda Union of Teachers and all our community partners who have a vested interest in Bermuda’s society and the wellbeing of Bermuda.”

PLP candidate Neville Tyrell made the point that children growing up in a wealthy country such as Bermuda should not be facing such issues.

He said: “In a small country like Bermuda, where there is accounting, medicine, law or business, while networking may have got you the interview, it was your education that got you the job.

“Your performance turned that job into a career and that career gave you a rich quality of life.

“But in 2017, that is unsustainable because we are just 22 square miles, and if bright, committed, supported students cannot make it in this economy with the wealth and opportunity here, then where else shall they go?”