Ms Anne Howard:

This year may not have been a great test or running example because, as I have said earlier on, we have come out of two very difficult years. My own experience of talking to colleagues and members on the ground is that they were exhausted. The planning was not in place and the apology came from the Department in May when we met its representatives on the summer provision. The Department gave reassurances in moving forward that the documentation would go to schools much earlier and reassurances on the roll-out of payment to both the SNAs and the teachers who engaged in the work. It said that it would also iron out many of the glitches that we had identified as issues at that meeting as we moved forward. I am not sure that this year is a good yardstick.