Ms Derval McDonagh:

I will address the Deputy’s first point. Accessible information is a fundamental right under the UNCRPD. We need to make many improvements in that space. It can sometimes be seen as a luxury add-on and people will provide accessible information if they have time, but it is fundamental to how people access their human rights and understand what their rights are.

The advocacy forum could be strengthened. It is ad hoc and reactive at the moment. We spent a good bit of time in the forum discussing summer programmes. There is no doubt that we needed to tease out that issue and we were reacting at a time when it needed attention. However, we need to move into a proactive and properly engaged space where we are seen as a consultative area and as partners at the table in the examination and co-design of the future of the education system for children, where our contribution is valued like other education partners and stakeholders’ contributions are. We need to get into the space of mapping out and tackling the critical issues facing children in the education system today. We need to start considering a vision for a more inclusive model of education over time. While we have examined some issues – they were valuable issues to examine – we also need to consider human rights issues, such as seclusion and restraint, the application of guidelines and the code of behaviour on children in school, etc. We need to get into that right space as quickly as we can.