Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I will take this opportunity to go to the parish pump. If we are recruiting SENOs, I wish to state that there is an absence of them in my area. The Minister of State might take note of that.

There is a shared objective, namely, that we do not have a scramble every year. There are almost 1 million children in our 4,000 schools and there is easily the capacity to accommodate these children, provided we plan early enough to ensure every child has an appropriate school place. We are not yet at that point, but that can be achieved not too far into the future. To achieve that, we need to have early forecasting. Do the NCSE and the Department have a number, even an estimate, of the number of children who will require special classes or schools in September 2023? If they have those figures, what are they? If not, when will they have them?

See this speech in context