Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am particularly pleased to be able to announce over €15 million in new funding to facilitate the full participation of children with disabilities in this scheme. We are also introducing a range of quality measures for early education, including audits, inspections and training, and restoring capitation levels in the sector.

To support parents in low-paid employment, we are going further. We are creating 8,000 places through the community child care subvention programme. To help with after school care, we are providing €3 million to develop school services in existing school buildings. Last year, I said that if circumstances allowed, we would increase child benefit by €5. I am happy to say that our success in reducing unemployment allows me to do this. In 2016, child benefit will be €140 per month for every child. Finally, to recognise the needs of modern families and the role of fathers in the household, I am happy to announce that we will legislate for statutory paternity leave of two weeks. This change will take affect from next September. The improvement in our public finances has given us the opportunity to assist hard-working parents. The package announced today will be of particular help to working mothers and by increasing participation in the labour force, these measures will also be a key contributor to economic growth.

Education

I am allocating €8.5 billion to education for current expenditure next year. Education depends on educators. Teachers have the capacity to transform a child's life. The quality of our teachers is consistently recognised in OECD comparisons. Education is also the engine of economic growth. Our teachers have a big responsibility. They teach the citizens of tomorrow. We have an excellent cadre of highly qualified young people coming into the teaching profession and I am pleased that the job openings they feared would not be there are now materialising. I can confirm that the allocation for 2016 will provide for over 2,260 new additional teaching posts, including 600 new resource teachers. This is in addition to the extra 610 special needs assistants and 190 resource teachers we already announced for next year.

We will also reduce the pupil-teacher ratio. At primary level, we are reducing it from 28:1 to 27:1 and at second level, it will fall from 19:1 to 18.7:1. Over the past five years, we have supported education. As our public finances improve, we will continue to invest in and develop this important sector.

Social protection

I am allocating €19.6 billion to the Department of Social Protection next year. Within this allocation, I am particularly anxious to protect and support our older citizens. We will, therefore, increase all pension payments by €3 per week from the start of next year. This is the first increase since 2009.

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