Mr. John Curtis:

You would have access. The turnover would be fairly similar. If you have that assistance at primary school, it tends to transfer, although not automatically.

I want to come back to a point Mr. McGorman made in the context of the SNAs and extra staff principals have to deal with now. It is a very important issue. It is only really coming into play in the last ten years during which time the number of SNAs in schools has increased. The extra staffing that principals have to manage is not reflected in any way, shape or form in the context of allocation to the schools or the salary earned by a principal. This is something that will have to be looked at. Fundamentally, what has been said about deputy principals is correct. In our submission, we made three fundamental points. One was around provision of guidance counsellors, one was around inter-agency co-operation and the final one around trying to give time to principals, as leaders in the school, to deal with the problem kids and the students in their care. Any way we can augment the provision of deputy principalships in our schools, we think that is huge.

We are very concerned about burnout among principals at the moment. During Covid things settled a little at school level because things quietened down to some extent but we are becoming more concerned now that there is burnout. Principals put up with a lot during Covid, they did an awful lot and they gave a lot of themselves. We think the best supports for schools come in at the deputy principal level, whether at primary level or post primary level.