Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy and acknowledge the great opportunity I had to visit her constituency recently and to see what wonderful, best-practice facilities we can see. I acknowledge the tremendous work of the local community and in particular the school community there. The Deputy is quite correct that significant progress has been made. For example, she referred to Dublin and we have been conscious in recent months that there were specific requirements in Dublin in terms of 80 places being required in special classes and 50 special school places. Due to the great work of all of these school communities on the ground, the 50 places in the special schools were provided for. Throughout Dublin, 300 additional places have been provided. That is a significant achievement. Obviously as the Deputy has outlined there will always be ongoing demand and challenge. I acknowledge that right throughout the country we have seen significant uptake from school communities. I would like to take the opportunity to acknowledge that where we have seen best practice in one school, we have seen almost a domino effect of other schools taking up opportunities to develop in a similar vein themselves.

Therefore, I am grateful to the schools that have taken it upon themselves to set the ball rolling in communities, because this has been very positive in local communities.

Regarding planning for future supply, because this is obviously a key element of the work we must do, particularly concerning additional special classes, almost 700 projects are currently progressing or are under way as part of the school building programme. In turn, this will deliver more than 1,300 new SEN classrooms and 200 replacement classrooms, catering for approximately 7,800 SEN pupils across primary and post-primary levels. Almost 100 of these projects are on-site now. Ultimately, this will deliver classroom spaces for almost 1,000 additional SEN pupils.

As of late, we have seen, and this aspect has been referred to, that 25% of the budget of the Department of Education is now being expended on special education. This is right and proper, and not before its time. There have been achievements but there is also a body of work that must continue and do so apace. Reference was also made to staff and support of staff. We now have the highest number of special education teachers, with 15,000 of them, with the number of SNAs standing at more than 19,000. A course is being funded by the Department for special education teachers to support that area of development.

Equally, we are looking at our initial teacher training. A significant component of that is inclusive education. Within the school system itself, we are also considering progression models for our students in respect of the types of curricula they might wish to follow. At the junior cycle level now, for example, we have level 1 and level 2. These will now transfer over as part of the senior cycle programme as well. Therefore, this is an ongoing body of work. We are continuing to tackle it from the construction point of view and from a staffing perspective. We are grateful for and appreciative of the genuine goodwill and determination of the school communities themselves. They recognise that the best model is the inclusive one and that we have an obligation to meet the needs of all our students at all times.