Malcolm Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the Minister of State may not necessarily be able to get into the details of the SNA contract negotiations. She referred to the specialised nature of the work and we all appreciate the work SNAs do. As the Minister of State herself said, those students with special educational needs in many cases would not survive without the support of SNAs. One thing that is important as part of any contract is that there is a requirement that the SNAs would specifically focus on the needs of those students with special educational needs and, in other words, that they are not seen as part of an overall staffing cohort within a school. I ask for the Minister of State's view with regard to that specific provision within the contract, namely, that the focus must be on the students with special educational needs as opposed to more general duties within the school.