Ms Derval McDonagh:

We must have an incredibly sensitive and nuanced conversation about school attendance. It clearly is an issue but we cannot pin it on the children and families, who desperately want their children to attend every day. The inspectorate report in 2024 stated that young people's attendance at school is linked directly to the extent to which they feel welcomed and included in the school community and the extent to which they find the classroom engaging, interesting and relevant. We must take that important data and consider what we can do differently to ensure children who desperately want to attend can do so and how to build resources into the system so that those children can turn up as their best selves.

Deputy Devine mentioned resources, and I appreciate that. As Ms Murrihy mentioned, sometimes it is not about more resources but is about different allocation. I would love the committee to consider the fact that the system we have developed now has not been made by design but has been made in a reactive way. It has mushroomed over time. We have developed a system of special schools, special classes and mainstream in a reactive way. We have never been led by the data. When I talk about data, it is about the direct lived experience of children and their families in the school system. We have no disaggregated data on the experience of disabled children in school and educational outcomes, despite the fact that one third of the budget is going into the education of disabled children. We have no disaggregated data. That is something we need to take seriously and take stock of. We can shape what the system should or could look like on the basis of the data coming from children and families about their experience.