Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)

I have consistently said the 2009 budget required difficult choices to be made across all areas of public expenditure. These decisions were made to control public expenditure and to ensure sustainability in the long run. In this respect education, while protected to a much greater extent than most other areas of public expenditure, could not be totally spared. At the time of the budget I set out the likely impact of the various measures including the projected net impact on teacher numbers in primary and post-primary schools, which was estimated at a loss of 200 posts in each sector. The budget measures will impact on individual schools in different ways depending on whether enrolment is rising or declining and the degree to which any one school has more teachers than it is entitled to under the allocation processes. Across the school system generally there will of course be some impact on class sizes and at post-primary level the changes may impact on the capacity of individual schools to offer as wide a range of subject choices as heretofore.

In terms of the position at individual school level the key factor for determining the level of resources provided by my Department is the pupil enrolment at 30 September 2008. The annual process of seeking this enrolment data from schools took place in the autumn and the data have since been received and processed in my Department enabling the commencement of the processes by which teaching resources are allocated to schools for next September.

My Department has written to the primary schools that are projected to have a net loss or gain in classroom teaching posts in September 2009. As part of my efforts to ensure that relevant information is openly available to the public, detailed information on the opening position for primary schools is published on my Department's website. This provisional list sets out the details on individual schools that, taken collectively, are projected to gain 128 posts and to lose 382 posts, a net reduction of 254 posts. It is my intention to have this information updated and ultimately to set out the final position when the allocation processes are completed.

Initial allocation letters have also issued to post primary schools and vocational educational committees. All these allocations, primary and post-primary, are provisional and reflect the initial allocation position. The final position for any one school will depend on a number of other factors such as the allocation of support teachers, additional posts for schools that are developing rapidly and posts allocated as a result of the appeals processes.

The operation of redeployment arrangements also impacts on the final position, as a teacher can remain in his or her existing school where a suitable redeployment position does not exist. The final staffing position for all schools will therefore not be known until the autumn. At that stage the allocation process will be fully completed for mainstream classroom teachers and any appeals to the staffing appeals board will have been considered. The appellate process is particularly relevant at post-primary level where any specific curricular needs of the school concerned are considered. Also at post-primary level there is no effective system-wide redeployment scheme and this can mean that schools retain teachers, though over quota.

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