Ms Martina Mannion:

I might just start at the end and work my way back, if that is okay. My colleague, Mr. Hanlon, will be able to provide more detail on the home tuition scheme. The Deputy talked about home tuition versus the right to home education and assessments. I want to make the distinction. Obviously, the Constitution recognises parents as primary educators. If parents wish to educate their children at home, that is provided for. The position is that parents need to register with the alternative education assessment and registration service, AERS, which is part of the Tusla education and welfare system. Parents must register with AERS and are required to ensure that their children are getting a certain minimum level of education. I will park that, because it does not pertain the home tuition scheme. Parents are allowed to do that and are supported under the Constitution to educate their children at home.

In relation to home tuition, we want to be very clear that we see it as something that is a short-term temporary measure to assist people who, for various reasons, may not be able to go to school or have difficulty accessing school. There are a number of different strands under the home tuition scheme. The biggest cohort of people who access home tuition are children with an autism diagnosis, who are between two and a half and three years of age and who could benefit from early intervention. There is also a cohort of children who are aged over three have the same diagnosis, who are accessing the early education system or the access and inclusion model, AIM, but are being topped-up by additional home tuition supports. They are very big numbers in that cohort. There is a small number of children who access the scheme who have medical conditions and cannot go to school, for example because they have cancer, and need short-term support. There are numbers of children who have mental issues, include those who potentially cannot face going into school. We also have very small numbers of children who are having home tuition because they do not have a school place. In earlier years there would have been bigger numbers of children who did not have a school place because our forward planning processes had not identified the sufficient numbers of special schools and classes that we needed. Those were the children that were effectively being forced into home tuition because we could not get the places. We believe we have a very robust forward planning process or special school and class places. We have opened seven new special schools and 300 special classes. We have opened new special classes for 2023-24 in every county. We are very hopeful that we have a methodology to support anybody who is looking to avail of home tuition while waiting on a special school or class place. Those are the broad brushstrokes of the home tuition piece. Perhaps Mr. Hanlon wants to add to that.