Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Every child has a right to an appropriate education. Year after year, we can set our watches by parents coming onto local radio stations, on the phone and through email to say that their child with additional needs cannot find a school place, only now it is the principals too who are on the local radio stations. Producers on those shows are ringing local TDs because they are so profoundly affected by the parents who apply to 20, 22, 23 or 25 schools and get 25 rejection letters. Everybody knows that if you have a child with additional needs, there are days when it feels like you are pushing a rock up a mountain. That is exactly the situation that our current education system is creating for these families. One word comes to mind when I see the trauma and hear the fear and upset in parents' voices, which is cruelty, because that is what this is. It is entirely preventable. The Department is well aware of where these children are and what their additional needs are, but the Department and successive governments have failed and failed again to plan.

7 o’clock

I want to be clear: this is not the responsibility of schools. This is not the responsibility of school leaders and it sure is not the responsibility of parents. The responsibility lies squarely on successive Governments. The Government needs to fix this and it needs to do so this urgently because each and every one of those children is entitled to the best possible education and to reach the best possible educational outcomes.

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