Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I note what the Deputy said about the court ruling. He spoke about the demarcation between the different Departments. The Department of Education will be assisting the HSE in relation to the AON process, which will hopefully speed up the time within which children will get therapists and the therapy they require. The HSE is responsible for therapists being provided to special schools. I appreciate the point the Deputy is making about collaboration between Departments. Rather than having Departments in their silos, they can work together. I assure the Deputy that I am working very closely with the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, in this regard to try to sort out these issues, as well as working with CORU on workforce planning for therapists. That is a big issue and is the primary reason the school inclusion model the Deputy referred to has not been expanded. That has recommenced within the pilot, which was run in Kildare, west Wicklow and south-west Dublin. There were 75 participating schools. It was a multidisciplinary approach with occupational therapists, speech and language therapists and behavioural practitioners. We want to be able to expend that throughout Ireland because it would be a gold-star service for our children who so badly need it. That is a separate type of multidisciplinary approach to the therapists that are being provided to the HSE. I agree that we need to keep this under constant review and make sure we are doing everything we can to provide these services to children with additional needs. That might mean changing practices or looking at things differently and I concur with the Deputy in that regard, particularly given the experience he has had as Minister for Education and Skills.

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