Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Disability Matters
An Inclusive Education for an Inclusive Society: Department of Education
6:00 pm
Mr. Frank Hanlon:
The Senator is right about the valuable work it does. It is a joint funding arrangement, North-South. It is 50:50. We work closely with our colleagues in the North of Ireland to look at the service they can do in the North and the South. We are talking to the Middletown centre about the bespoke business plan for us, very much along the lines of what the Senator talked about with regard to getting into more schools, assisting schools and individual pupils, and looking at the whole-school model that has proved successful. With the 50:50 funding model, careful consideration has to be given to it, even from a budgetary point of view. We are working closely with our colleagues in the North to expand that service.