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

I commend the work of my colleague, Deputy Sorca Clarke, on this issue. This is ever a debate at this time of year, particularly with regard to the issues in respect of summer provision and access to school places for September, which is always a really challenging issue for many families.

Deputy Paul Murphy correctly highlighted the Jesuitical attempt to say that there was no cut in the capitation grant. The simple fact is that there has been a decrease of €15 per child in the capitation grant. That will undoubtedly undermine the quality and types of activities that can be offered to children in summer provision. We are going to see that over the course of the summer.

Equally Jesuitical is the distinction the Minister of State, Deputy Richmond, made in his speech. He said that:

Complex needs have not been removed. Instead, the data which was used since 2017 from the children's disability network team, CDNT, and which is no longer routinely available, is being replaced by high-quality, verifiable education data.

Unless I am misunderstanding, this seems to be school population-level information. That is nowhere near good enough to determine the increased demands a class and its staff will face because of somebody in the class having complex needs. It is in no way responsive enough to the needs of the individual child in a class who has complex needs. Down Syndrome Ireland is right to say that this is effectively a removal of complex educational needs from the criteria for the allocation of special education teachers. Taking a school population-level approach, looking at the data of the whole cohort, is just not good enough and means that children with complex needs will not get the support they need.

In the time I have left, I will again flag an issue I have raised on a number of occasions, that of therapists in special schools. I have previously raised the issue at St. Killian's Special School. The school was encouraged to go out and find therapists on the strength of a commitment from the Department but funding has not been forthcoming. I will also raise an issue relating to Rochestown Community Special School. When will therapists be put in place at the school? One child there has been waiting for three years. This is a seven-year-old child who is non-verbal and attending a special school and has been waiting three years for an appointment with an SLT. That is simply not good enough. It is a sign of the system just not working for children in special schools.

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