Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Ó Ríordáin. He has made me feel even stronger about the point I made in my first response about the importance of the Equal start programme. I was not aware of the statistics on three-year-olds, but they are stark. I am pleased that the Equal Start programme, which is like DEIS for pre-school, will begin this September with 32,000 of the youngest children benefiting for the first time from positive discrimination, if you like, in funding and staffing allocations. We are determined to do more on DEIS and educational disadvantage. The pathway we will follow to do that is the conclusion of the OECD research, in addition to the work the Minister, Deputy Foley, and her Department are doing at the moment. They recently concluded a consultation with approximately 200 principals of post-primary and primary schools. That, in addition to the OECD work over the summer months, will feed into the opportunity to develop the next steps on the DEIS journey.

I have a funny feeling we will hear from the Deputy again on this matter, whether he is in Dublin or Brussels, and we look forward to continuing to engage.

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