Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)

I thank the Deputy for raising this. I join with her in commending the fabulous work by our secretaries and caretakers in our schools. I had the opportunity last week to meet many of them at the Fórsa conference as part of the overall Easter conferences. We have made a lot of progress, notably in changing the way our secretaries are paid so they are now paid through the Department of Education. We are hoping to make similar progress for our caretakers. The next step, and the next request from our secretaries, is that there would be pension parity along with those changes. That is engagement that will have to happen as part of an overall engagement with the Department of public expenditure and reform. That engagement is ongoing through my Department with the Department of public expenditure and reform. We will engage with our secretaries and caretakers through their representative organisation as well. They are an integral part of our schools and it is really important that we support them in every way we can.

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