Professor Paul Downes:

A multidisciplinary team, family scope, was designed in Ballyfermot 20 years ago. There are certain key professions and we must be clear about what we want each person on the team to achieve. We have advocated with Ministers for speech and language therapists and occupational therapists in schools. We know there are pilot schemes running in that regard. I have done two reviews for the European Commission around these issues. At a previous meeting with the committee, I argued that we need to look at the Danish and Dutch models. There are multidisciplinary teams for every school in Denmark. Ireland has been playing catch-up in this area for decades. The UK is playing catch-up now. The Dorset model we are considering would, to be blunt, be unremarkable in a European context. It depends on which professions we want in our teams to achieve which objectives.

I do not accept there is a shortage of specialist emotional counsellors in the Irish system. In our longer submission to the committee, we quoted Ms Angie O'Brien, chairperson of the Irish Association for Creative Arts Therapists, who has stated there is easily sufficient capacity to fill those roles. In respect of direct delivery and one-to-one support services, we can fill those roles in a national pilot scheme.