Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In my earlier reply I outlined to the Deputy how the vast majority of guidance support will operate within the school community in future. The representative organisations for school principals and my Department have worked to develop a framework to allow schools to best manage the provision of guidance from within their staffing allocations. That puts a greater emphasis on group work and class-based activity and, for the significant majority of the role fulfilled by guidance counsellors, I argue that it is more than sufficient. Where the need arises for one-to-one support for young people, particularly where they experience mental health issues or other challenges, it is important that guidance and support are allocated to them as needed. Well developed and managed student support teams are central to the successful implementation of guidance, and two previous documents which have outlined how that might happen are the guidelines Well-Being in Post-Primary School, which were published in 2013, and A Continuum of Support for Post-Primary Schools, which was published in 2010. These documents provide a framework for schools to support students with social, emotional or academic needs, and their implementation will make a significant contribution to the general well-being of young people and provide a stable and supportive learning environment for all students.

Guidance counsellors have two distinct functions. The first is general career guidance and guidance on the educational opportunities a child or young person might pursue, while the second involves support for students' well-being. If a school manages its resources well in terms of guidance, I do not think either of those provisions will suffer at any point in the future.

See this speech in context