Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will do my best. I will respond to a few individuals together who raised the same questions. I thank the committee for engaging on issues like patronage and I will revert soon on the admissions to schools Bill when it is brought through the Oireachtas. We will have an opportunity to engage, in more depth, on some of these issues.

Deputies McConalogue and O'Brien asked about the coming year and the projected cuts and expenditure ceilings. A sum of €39 million was the original expenditure ceiling projected for our Department for this coming year. That was part of the projections across all Departments that were to yield what was to be approximately €2 million in cuts. Thankfully the economy has moved on since then.

We are in a budgetary negotiation at the moment but that would have been the cut, should we have stood still in terms of the demands on expenditure and taxation, etc. Each budget is different and we are in a different situation at the moment. I do want to say to the committee that there are pressures, particularly demographic pressures, so there are extra costs simply because there are more children at all levels in education. Those are not just costs around teachers and capitation, but also costs around school transport, student grants, etc. Those demographic pressures mean that with the same amount of money as we had last year we have extra demands. That is the context in which the €39 million sits.