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

My time is short, and I do appreciate my colleagues, Deputies Gannon and Tully, joining me in this debate.

Nothing really brings shame to the Department of Education more than its treatment of special needs assistants, SNAs, who we send into the war against Covid in classrooms throughout the country without basic provision for their own safety and without any sense of when they will be vaccinated. It is quite clear that when it comes to actually paying them, however, the Department will do everything it can resist that temptation. What we are talking about here is proper accreditation for the certification which they receive. We are having difficulty in getting that accreditation. The suspicion is the Department does not want to sanction such accreditation because it would mean SNAs would have to be properly paid. On that basis, I am interested to hear the Minister of State's response. I am also interested to hear the contributions of my colleagues.

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