Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate what Deputy Connolly said. We are all at a disadvantage here because we have not seen the policy yet, draft or otherwise.

Deputy Farrell raised Wales, where I visited. I was very keen to see the remarkable progress that is being made there. I met with staff, young people and experts in that area to get a feel for how they were making progress. In terms of the specific question on whether the targets will be part of the policy, I have not seen the draft yet but it is overall ambition, it is even in the programme for Government that we want to see a doubling of students participating in Irish-medium education. There is a very clear determination there. Regarding what will be in the actual policy, I will have to wait until I see it. I expect to see it in the coming weeks, certainly within the coming months. It is clearly an aim of the programme for Government at the very least. Approximately 57,000 pupils are going through Irish-medium education. The aim is to double that again to 114,000. That is a programme for Government ambition and I anticipate that there would be a similar ambition in the policy.