Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

Class size may be an issue for the parent whose child does not need anything extra. The special needs and resource teachers are necessary for the child who has a learning difficulty. The 1,800 teachers who teach nothing but English to newcomers are important for the children who do not speak English. The home-school community liaison teacher is important for the parent who needs support to link in.

Class size is an issue for some people but schools are staffed for their mainstream classroom teacher in the ratio of 1:27. There is no international evidence to show that class size makes a whit of difference to the outcomes except in the lowest classes. Notwithstanding that it makes no difference up the line, we have made a commitment to ensure that we continue to reduce class size but it is equally important that the other supports are available too. If in the past three years all the teachers who went into special needs and language teaching had been employed to reduce class sizes the ratio would be approximately 1:15 but we had to prioritise the most vulnerable people such as the disadvantaged who have small class sizes, those with special educational needs and newcomers who do not speak English.

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