Ms Gr?inne Cullen:

Obviously, Youthreach comes under the Department of further and higher education. It does not sit within our Department. It would be in the Solas figures that we mentioned earlier on with regard to trying to track children through. I do not have a lot of detail on it but there is out-of-school provision. There are non-registered schools where they provide a pathway for children who fall out of the mainstream system. There was a review of that out-of-school provision done in the last number of years, and at the moment there is an active group looking an action and implementation plan for the recommendations of that report. That plan is due in the next couple of months as well. That is starting to look at how we can organise that provision better if a child does fall out of school.

Other people say through the consultation that sometimes schools just do not suit the child. There needs to be a pathway for those children. It is maybe not just Youthreach. It is really important. As Youthreach has a funding piece to it too, it can be attractive to the children. It can be a draw out of school, in fact. We are trying to look at those pathways and make sure that what we do have in the out-of-school cohort is well organised, and that children are supported in that too.