Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

The programme for Government clearly states that education will be a priority for this Government and that we will endeavour to protect and enhance the educational experience of children, young people and students. To this end, we will endeavour to protect front line services in education. However, the fiscal position is difficult and the country is effectively in receivership. It is necessary to ensure that educational services are delivered within the resources available. While I intend to prioritise and support special educational services, I cannot revisit the previous Government's decision to place a cap on the number of posts available under the SNA scheme. This number is 10,575 whole-time equivalent posts. It is a significant number and, unlike other areas of the public sector, vacancies are being filled up to this number. It also represents continual increases in the number of SNAs in recent years. It is considered that, with equitable and careful management and distribution of these resources, there should be sufficient posts to provide access to SNA support for all children who require such care support to attend school in accordance with departmental criteria.

The National Council for Special Education, NCSE, is responsible, through its network of local special educational needs organisers, SENOs, for allocating resource teachers and SNAs to schools to support children with special educational needs. The NCSE operates within my Department's criteria in allocating such support. The NCSE has issued a circular to all schools advising of the allocation process for the 2011-2012 school year. A key feature of the amended scheme will be to provide for an annual allocation of SNA support to eligible schools.

My Department and I will be glad to consider suggestions from school managements or parent representative organisations as to how the allocation of SNA resources can best be managed within the context of the established overall limit on SNA numbers. In this regard, I am committed to making whatever improvements are possible to the resource allocation system, but we must understand the legacy of economic mismanagement that the last Government gave to this country.

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