Ms Helen Walsh:

I thank the Deputy for the questions. We have identified difficulties in a number of areas nationally. To directly answer the question as to whether there is a crisis, I am hopeful that there is not, but that does not mean that parents who are seeking a special class placement have equity of access at this point in time. What I can say is that we are working intensively with the Department. Last year, for example, when there were pressures, we dealt with that, although we do not want to over-commend ourselves on the success in placing children. However, there is certainly an added complexity this year in the provision of accommodation for schools, and that applies right across the State. Whereas, ordinarily, SENOs would set up classes, provide access to those classes and signpost the classes, we have the additional complexity of trying to ensure we are exploring all existing accommodation in schools within an area to make sure that accommodation is used first. We are looking at reduced enrolments in schools to see if rooms have been freed up that can be used in that space.

Obviously, we operate within fiscal parameters, although that does not mean a parent should not know where their child is going in September. We are further ahead in our planning. Every year, we hope to get better and while it might feel like cold comfort to a parent who is desperately seeking a place, the same as they would for a mainstream place, we are further ahead in our planning. We are tackling very deliberately at this point those, for want of better language, hotspots where a number of students are known to us and the provision has not yet fully been established or scoped out for September. The way to get around this is our work with the Department’s planning and building unit and special education unit to try to ensure that is the case.

While we offered school places last year, some parents may have decided that is not the place they want and they still want to go to their local place, so there are a number of vacancies around the country, probably in the hundreds. Some of that is within rural communities and we would not expect to fill those schools but, in reality, we are trying to go through the lists of available places for children within a suitable distance. We do not like to hear of people travelling for an hour or an hour and a half on a bus to get to what should be their local school placement. At the same time, we have to ensure there is sufficient provision within that reasonable distance.

We are working our way through it very intensively. The 65 or 68 SENOs are out in the field daily to try to explore every single option that is available to us. We do not have responsibility for buildings and accommodation within the school sector, but we are doing everything we can to join that gap and to liaise between schools and the planning and building unit to speed up and escalate the process.

Mr. Kearney mentioned there are ten to 15 classes appearing on the system weekly. Last year, we were not as far advanced. While we know that we need in the region of 250 primary places and 146 special class places at post-primary, that may not prove to be the case. In our projections, we have done a lot of work on forecasting and forward planning. The post-primary need often does not materialise, which might be because some students are going to a special school context, but within the primary sector, we can guarantee at this point at least 183 of those 253 classes. We have to work harder and faster to try to ensure parents are not waiting for a special class place for September. However, as Mr. Kearney referenced for all constituencies, we aim to meet public representatives and answer their questions. We are doing that on an ongoing basis where we know those hotspots and difficulties are arising.