Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am disappointed with the reply. As I have consistently said, this has nothing to do with school identification or the identification of need. It is not so much an amalgamation but a takeover. A DEIS school with 450 students amalgamated with a non-DEIS school with 29 students and the status was lost. Nothing changed in terms of the student cohort. If the amalgamation had not proceeded, the 450 students would continue to have DEIS supports. All that happened was a Department policy was pursued, which was to strengthen schools and go down the route of amalgamation. Assurances were definitely given. The minutes of board of management meetings are available. The Minister of State knows schools well enough to know that a board of management would not have signed up to something such as this unless assurances were given during the process.

It is welcome that the DEIS programme is being reviewed. It is an important and successful programme, but in this specific instance there is a bureaucratic issue. The profile of the students has not changed. To use the Minister of State's own phrase, the "appropriate eligibility criteria" have not changed. In terms of identifying the schools and socio-economic differences, they did not change either. In line with what is happening in all rural areas, they have, in fact, got worse. It is beyond me why someone cannot knock heads together in the Department and point to the reality that nothing has changed except a roll number. As a result of the change in the roll number, DEIS status and all that goes with it has been lost. That is stupid and silly. I encourage the Minister of State to return to his officials and knock their heads together. On the basis of his timeline, it will be another two academic years before the supports kick in. There is no guarantee either of the result of what is a bureaucratic issue.

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