Mary O'Rourke (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)

There is no point in saying we brought all this on ourselves, which I have heard. What about the major advances in pension entitlements and special needs assistants, SNAs? Special needs assistants were not heard of ten years ago but now there are SNAs in schools and parents with a child with a particular difficulty can have the assistance of an SNA to help him or her through the school years. The measure was a marvellous advantage in the world of education. I did not bring it in because we had no money at all when I was Minister.

There is also the capital programme, which has a significant backlog of projects to be attended to. Every one of us as Deputies could stand up and list off primary and post-primary projects that are badly needed. We hope that funding from the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, will enable us to finish what is on hand and give the go-ahead to some new projects.

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