James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)

I congratulate my colleague, Deputy Brian Hayes, on tabling this motion and for allowing us the opportunity to speak to it. The record of the Government when it comes to the most vulnerable in our society is appalling. One need only remind oneself of the long hard struggle in which sufferers of cystic fibrosis had to engage to ensure that their oft-promised facilities at St. Vincent's Hospital would be built and delivered. Although we have the Ministers word on this, we will watch this space carefully. We have seen medical cards taken from the elderly, our children deprived of vaccination against cervical cancer despite being promised they would be afforded this protection, the terminally ill being means-tested and failing those means tests for a medical card, and, in the last week, people queuing to die as they cannot get into palliative care centres. Against that background, to see the Minister, on behalf of this Fianna Fail Government, deprive our children with mild general learning disability of the services which had served them so well in their special classes is not surprising, but nonetheless it is appalling.

The foolishness of this decision and the callousness of it ranks with the other areas I mentioned already. It is foolish because it will not save money. It will cost more money as these children will find themselves in mainstream classes in need of special needs assistants and help. It is costly because it impedes their ability to reach their full potential and will impede the development of the other students in the class, thus costing the economy further down the line. In any event, in one school four of these children will be entitled to 17 hours a week, that is, a full teacher, and no saving will be made. It is callous because it discards the concerns of these children's parents and their teachers and disregards the real need of this group of children, many of whom have progressed into the mainstream from these classes.

In my constituency there are three schools concerned - St. Helen's in Portmarnock which I visited, Brackenstown in Swords and St. Teresa's in Balbriggan. St. Teresa's in Balbriggan is a case in point. This is a primary school in a rapidly developing part of Dublin where parents are finding it exceedingly difficult to get their children into school. In this school there are two special needs classes with nine pupils in each and a waiting list of nine pupils, and yet the Minister in his wisdom has determined that one of these classes should go. One of his arguments is that it is best practice that these children be taught in a mainstream school. With that being the Minister's logic, could he tell the good people of Balbriggan and this House why this form of justice is to be delivered to one class while the other remains in place?

There is no logic to this. Furthermore, with no guidelines in place and all of these children having received a NEPS report, it is now left to the headmaster and the board of the school to decide which children will remain in the special needs class and which will not. In the absence of any national guidelines, this means the teachers and the board are placed in an invidious position. What logic can be used to distinguish between the children? Will the Minister for Education and Science guarantee primary school principals, teachers and boards of management that he will indemnify them against future action by parents for depriving their children of this service when others were left to avail of it with nothing to distinguish them, given they all have the National Educational Psychological Service report?

St. Teresa's accepts children from not just Balbriggan but from Balrothery, Balscadden, Naul, Oldtown, Ballyboughal, Lusk, Skerries, Loughshinny, Rush and Donabate. This ill-conceived blunt instrument, designed to do nothing other than to save money without regard for the future of our children, will deprive the entire of Fingal county of their human right, the right to an appropriate education. The Minister for Education and Science will be long remembered for this and for all the wrong reasons.

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