Ms Deirdre McDonnell:

The number of release days for principals have been increased and I will forward the exact details to the committee. Funding has been provided in the budget for an increase in management posts in schools. The total number is 2,600 management posts or 1,300 posts each for primary and post-primary schools.

In terms of supply panels, we can consider the matter in the future. I believe that the model needs to be considered differently in terms of how it might work. The issue has been ruled out but not in terms of the way it worked previously.

In terms of the availability of substitute teachers, it is one of the issues that we need to consider. Some management bodies are running good services for schools and I refer to a scheme called TextaSub and those kinds of services. That might be something that we need to consider in terms of how we can better support access to the jobs that are available and convey information to people.

I look after the payroll systems in the Department. Therefore, I know that all of the claims are submitted using my Department's online claims system, apart from Education and Training Boards Ireland, ETBI, schools. We will be able to analyse how many substitutable and non-substitutable days there are and assess how they are being administered in the school system. We will get more data on the issue that we can feed into the model.