Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This Government is committed to improving staffing levels in primary schools and supporting the recruitment and retention of teachers. According to the latest published data from November 2025, there were more than 97% of allocated primary teaching posts filled. Teacher numbers at primary level have increased by almost 6,000 since 2019 and now stand at the highest level ever recorded at over 43,400.

The Government is investing a record €14.1 billion in education and schools through budget 2026. This record level of investment has enabled significant progress in tackling educational disadvantage and supporting children and young people with special educational needs to achieve their full potential. Funding has been provided for 860 additional special education teachers across special schools and mainstream settings, together with more than 1,700 additional special needs assistants.

Budget 2026 also includes an additional €48 million full-year investment across both the DEIS strategy and the DEIS plus scheme. That provides more teaching positions and more staffing and supports for schools as well. That DEIS programme will benefit approximately 30,000 children and young people attending DEIS plus schools as well as one in four children across schools in the DES programme.

Under the programme for Government, there is a commitment to reduce the general primary pupil-teacher ratio to 19:1 over the lifetime of the Government and to introduce targeted measures for schools with very large class sizes. This builds on substantial progress already made. The primary staffing schedule has improved from an average allocation ratio of 26:1, five years ago, to 23:1 for the current school year, which is the lowest ever at primary level. Average class sizes have fallen from 24.1 to 22.2 pupils, while the overall pupil-teacher ratio improved from 15:1 in 2019-2020 to 12.8:1 in 2023-2024, which is comparing favourably with the OECD average levels.

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