The teachers' union has welcomed news that enrolment figures for primary schools have increased for the first time in years this year - but has urged Government to start preparing for increasing numbers now.

General Secretary of the Bermuda Union of Teachers (BUT) Michael Charles said he was pleased that more parents appeared to have growing confidence in the public education system and had opted to place their children in Government schools.

And he said that while he was not concerned that the increase in primary one enrolments this year had led the Ministry to raise class sizes from 15 students to 18, he hoped that Government would monitor the trend so that class sizes did not continue to creep up every year.

Mr. Charles said: "I suppose it's encouraging that more people are getting into public education.

"I think this is the first year it has happened for a while, and, if it's correct, then it's a good sign."

Mr. Charles said he believed that the new literacy programme for primary students and the reduced class sizes could have led some parents to have more faith in the system.

However, he said if Government succeeded in attracting more students to the public system, as it hoped, he urged it to start planning well in advance.

"I hope they are looking ahead and planning ahead," said Mr. Charles.

"When the Government restructured class sizes a couple of years ago there was a problem finding places in schools for students.

"They had to build new classrooms to cater. I hope the Ministry is looking at the trends and if the growth continues something else will happen to deal with the extra students.

"I know it is very early days, and this is the first increase, but we will need more accommodation if it continues. We don't want to find, all of sudden, that next year there will be 20 students in some classes. We have the reduced class sizes, we want to keep them."

Yesterday, the Ministry said it was keeping close tabs on the number of students enrolling in the public system, as well as the birth rate, to ensure there were sufficient school spaces for primary children.

Acting chief education officer Joeann Smith said: "We are keeping trend data on the numbers of students enrolling in public schools, as well as monitoring the birth rate each year.

"Based on the analysis of this information, we will, if necessary, consider establishing new classes in schools where the physical plant permits."

But this week Shadow Minister Tim Smith said he was sceptical about the figures released last week, and urged Government to release figures pertaining to which schools had seen an increase in enrolments, and which had seen a decrease.

He said: "The Minister did not offer a specific explanation as to why she thought enrolment was up nor did she confirm if enrolment was up in all primary schools.

"She described the increase in enrolment as 'good news' and I inferred she was saying that confidence in the public education system had returned; hence the increase in registrations.

"But I simply don't buy it. Maybe the increase in registrations can be explained by higher birth rates in 1997, that is, more children who are now of primary school age were born in 1997."

Mr. Smith said 1997 had the highest birth rate in all of the 1990s.

However, he said even with the higher birth rate, he doubted there was an overall net increase in registrations across all primary schools for this year.

He added: "Registrations in some schools are probably up, but I bet dollars to doughnuts that in other schools they are down."