Jen Cummins (Dublin South Central, Social Democrats)

I have a few things to raise. Mentioned several times were special education needs, the therapies that are going to go into schools and increasing the number of places for SLT, OT and other therapies. Is this going to happen for this year, and, if so, how many new places will there be and where will they be?

On the topic of adult educators, I was working on a school completion programme in Ballymun but I was based in an adult education service building. We had many things in that the building, including Youthreach. It is a great facility. Those educators, however, are worried about their contracts. As has been mentioned several times, are there a number of ETBs who have not yet fulfilled what they are supposed to be doing in terms of industrial relations? Does the Minister have powers or is he able to do anything to ensure every person who is supposed to get such a contract gets one and gets it fully?

Turning to community training centres, these used to be funded by FÁS and the pay scales were under the remit of that organisation. After FÁS closed, those community training centres moved to the ETB systems. The pay scales have not transferred over, so there is a two-tier system of Youthreach co-ordinators, community training centre managers and all the related staff not being on the same level. Is this issue on the Minister's radar and if it is, whether a plan is in place to rectify the issue?