Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Minister made reference to agreements made in 2005 and a circular issued in 2011. We were not in the middle of a pandemic in 2005 or 2011. There is no recognition from her Department that things have radically changed and that schools would not be open if it were not for special needs assistants. There must be some accommodation by the Department of the need for flexibility at this time. I have said before that if one is not a teacher or a building, the Department does not know what to do with one. There is an incredible inability to be in any way flexible. I will put my question to the Minister again. Does she expect SNAs to go into their workplace outside of contact hours and complete the 72 hours? Any reasonable and rational person would suggest that during periods of level 4 and 5 restrictions, which are considered to be very at-risk scenarios for everyone, this is an unreasonable expectation of SNAs.

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