Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

An audit was conducted of approximately 50% of schools examining the treatment of those with special needs, Travellers, newcomers etc. I am not inclined to publish it because that might give rise to league tables in certain areas which would pressurise the schools that take a significant number of children with special needs. Publishing results for an area could give the impression that a particular school took only children with special needs which would be unfair to the school. It does however provide me with valuable information for determining the future policy direction. I do not have the final statistics but the preliminary results show that some schools are taking more than their share of children with special needs. Giving resources to the schools helps to smooth that difference.

See this speech in context