Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

That is the first point. The fact that reports issue recommendations and Ministers do not act upon them does not mean the Ministers are at fault in any way. We may not agree with the recommendations and there may be other ways of dealing with the recommendations.

The Department of Education and Science has developed policy in this area in recent years. It has been having a great degree of success in many respects in mainstreaming people with disabilities into the education system. Significant resources are being applied and thousands of people are being employed in the education system. We have moved from a very poor situation to one which has greatly improved and is much to the credit of this Minister and of previous Ministers who have taken up this matter.

I know parents have had specific views about the type of education they believe would be most appropriate for their children. However, education policy is decided by the Department while listening to all those concerns but not necessarily agreeing in total with views however well motivated and well-intentioned with regard to the interests of their children. This is the problem which the Government has been grappling with in the interests of the best educational needs of those children.

Deputy Hanafin has a very good record in this area. The question of how this type of education is applied within the mainstream is the real challenge. There is a continuing debate with interested groups about specialist schools which are separate from mainstream schooling. I am particularly acquainted with this debate since I regularly speak to parents in my constituency about these matters.

The fact that specific recommendations are made does not mean that the Minister is not working on this matter or is not coming up with results and improvements which may not exactly equate with what certain people believe is the right way but I reiterate that significant improvements are being made.

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