John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I raise this matter in the context of the serious difficulties parents of autistic children in Kilkenny and my constituency generally have had in obtaining an assessment and discovering where on the autistic spectrum their children lie. As a result, they have had to go to the great expense of attending consultants in England and in Dublin. Consultants have come to visit the families of autistic children also. It is difficult enough for families to deal with these problems at home in the absence of support and assistance from the State without having to travel across or outside the country to obtain the assessments they need to determine where children should go to school or to receive the intervention they require. Needs can be particular to the child and the family concerned.

The degree of difficulty faced by these families is so great that they picketed the offices of the South Eastern Health Board some months ago to highlight their problems. Since then, they have received the same lack of response from the health board which they continually received previously. That is unacceptable. To take matters into their own hands, the parents in question have located a school building in Goresbridge in County Kilkenny. The structure of the building is sound.

At a meeting with officials from the Department of Education and Science seeking assistance, which I attended with Mr. Marc de Salvo, they were told a comprehensive response would be given within 30 days. To date, only some queries have been answered. Last week, they were informed that some moneys would be available but not for the development of the school.

While we are waiting on reports, families are suffering. It has been proven that autistic children become better at school and are at the point of entering mainstream education when assessment and intervention take place. There is an onus on the Department to be proactive in this matter and not for the information to be dragged from it. I noted at the Committee on Public Accounts that a suitable property in Myshall was passed from the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform to the Department of Health and Children. The South Eastern Health Board has admitted the property is too far from its operations to be of use. If funding is the problem, then the health board can sell this property, ring fence the proceeds for the proposed school at Goresbridge and immediately invest the money in the development proposed by the families.

The families have taken advice from all quarters on this matter. All that is needed is support from the Government and the South Eastern Health Board in order to carry out the assessments and define the supports and intervention for the children involved . The Department of Education and Science can then acknowledge that the building is sound for housing the New Horizons project in County Kilkenny. From there, it could satisfy the need for those dealing with this problem in their own time and homes.

During the meeting in Athlone with departmental officials, I acknowledged the difficulties and frustrations with bureaucracy faced by these families. Will the Minister of State at the Department of Education and Science remove these obstacles and give the families encouragement rather than challenges? Will the health board dispose of the property so as to fund a proper special school for autistic children in Goresbridge?

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I am pleased to outline to the House the position on the establishment of a special facility for children with autism at Goresbridge, County Kilkenny.

The Department of Education and Science is actively considering the application referred to by the Deputy. Officials from the Department are liaising with the Department's inspectorate, the National Educational Psychological Service and the patron bodies. I can confirm that one of the officials from the Department was in recent contact with a member of the parents' representative group. The Department confirmed that, as a matter of general policy, it is favourably disposed to making educational provision for children with autism as and when required. The details of each application have to be examined carefully, having regard to such matters as the assessment reports for the individual children, the suitability of proposed accommodation from an educational and health and safety perspective and the proximity of existing autism-specific provision in the area. The Department's objective would be to complete all necessary inquiries so that if the application were to be approved, the new facility would be in a position to commence operation from the start of the next school year.

An official from the Department's technical section is arranging to examine the building proposed for the new facility in Goresbridge, County Kilkenny, this week. Pending a decision on the application, the Department has agreed to fund a structured home programme for the children concerned, subject to confirmation from the parents that the proposal is acceptable. I thank Deputy McGuinness for giving me the opportunity to clarify this matter.

Jerry Cowley (Mayo, Independent)
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I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this matter concerning two children in the same family. The eldest child in the family waited three years to be assessed for dyslexia by the Department of Education and Science. It was a matter of concern as he was 11 years old, with one year left in national school. He was finally assessed by the Department on 30 September 2003. As a result, he was promised resource teaching of 2.5 hours per week which he has yet to receive. His assessment profile meets the primary criteria for dyslexia but he only receives learning support for 15 to 20 minutes per day for two weeks every month. He receives none of the specialised resource teaching despite the Department's recommendation. This will put him at a disadvantage when he enters secondary school soon. Will the Minister of State confirm there are 4,000 children in the western half of the country waiting for services already recommended by the Department?

The second child, who is seven years of age, was noticed by the school to have reading problems in October 2003. The mother asked for an assessment for possible dyslexia on the grounds of his older brother's condition. The school informed the mother that his condition was not considered to be severe enough to warrant assessment by the Department. The school also pointed out that the child would have to be severely affected to qualify for assessment as only a certain number of children could be assessed. This figure, she learned, was based on the number of children attending the school and meant only 2%, or two children per year, could be assessed. This quota basis was confirmed to the mother by a departmental official for the Mayo area. If this is true, then any child falling outside the quota is simply forgotten.

The mother was also informed that other children were worse-off and needed to be assessed. In the younger child's class alone, there were seven children requiring assessment. The mother is involved in the dyslexia workshop in Ballina. She informed me this evening that she has had to organise a private assessment for her younger son. Though the school has been helpful, the mother feels hard done by. The school has been put into a difficult situation acting as judge and jury in these cases. Parents who persist in demands for assessments feel they are hassling the school. This inequitable process needs to be changed urgently. It is leading to educational apartheid where, as the boys' mother believes, those with money can avail of private assessments and those without cannot do so.

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I thank Deputy Cowley for raising this matter which is of grave concern to him. I am as anxious as the Deputy to ensure there is true equality of access to psychological assessments and remedial intervention for all children with learning difficulties. The National Educational Psychological Service has made considerable investments in the provision of additional resources for children with special educational needs. The programme of the last Government contained a commitment to developing psychological services for children and young people. A planning group established to review provision in this area reported in mid-September 1998. The central recommendation in the report was the establishment of a NEPS agency under the aegis of the Department of Education and Science with a dedicated role in the development and provision of an educational psychological service and with a new organisational structure.

Following a Government decision that approved the findings of the planning group, the NEPS agency came into being on 1 September 1999. On that date 43 Department psychologists began working in NEPS. NEPS has delegated authority to develop and provide an educational psychological service to all students who need it in primary and post-primary schools and in certain other centres supported by the Department. The target staffing level recommended by the planning group is 200 psychologists. Notwithstanding the time-consuming aspects of recruiting professional staff, the Department has appointed a substantial number of additional psychologists since 1999 for assignment to NEPS. The total number of psychologists serving in NEPS is 127, including one on assignment to other duties in the Department of Education and Science. Four other psychologists are on career break at present, bringing the total to 131. The Department intends to continue to recruit additional psychologists to make up the shortfall as resources permit and bearing in mind the general staffing constraints at present.

NEPS is currently in a position to provide a psychological service to most second level schools and approximately 1,760 primary schools. In Mayo, NEPS provides a service to 81.78% of all schools, serving 88.28% of pupils. Eventually, when NEPS is at full strength, its psychologists will be able to provide a full educational psychological service to all primary and post-primary schools. However, it has not been possible to expand this service to all schools at once. It is of equal importance that the development of the new agency will be done in an equitable and orderly manner while ensuring that school children are not left without essential assessment services.

A draft detailed five-year expansion plan, including proposals, region by region, for the allocation of additional psychologists and for the location of NEPS offices, was approved in April 2000 by the NEPS national policy advisory board. It was inevitable that during the development period there would remain a backlog of assessment work. However, good progress has been made in general.

In the case of the child referred to by the Deputy, inquiries have been made with NEPS. The school in question, Scoil Naomh Feichin, Attymass, has been in receipt of a service from NEPS since 2000. The child's older sibling was first referred to NEPS on 19 September 2003 and was assessed by the assigned NEPS psychologist on 30 September 2003, following which a psychological report was issued to the school. This was an exceptionally speedy response. Prior to the assessment, the psychologist met the parents and gave them direct feedback in September 2003. The older sibling is currently in receipt of learning support provision and the psychologist has recommended an extension of this provision.

I understand that the teachers in the school do not consider the younger boy to be a priority for individual psychological assessment at this time. However, the fact that a child has not been assessed for dyslexia does not prevent access to the learning support service that is available to schools. The child in question is currently receiving learning support. However, it has been requested that the NEPS psychologist for the school consult the school principal and class teacher without delay and ensure that the matter is kept under review.

Learning support is the most appropriate intervention for children with specific learning disabilities. Learning support teachers have access to a variety of diagnostic tests that enable them to put an individual learning programme into place immediately. Under the current system of special education resourcing, the small number of children who fail to make progress with the learning support teacher may have access to additional resource teaching hours, provided they have been assessed by an educational psychologist as having a severe learning disability.

The Department of Education and Science is aware that there have been delays for some children in accessing such individual assessments. Recently, the Department announced a move to a weighted system for the allocation of special education resources. This means that each school will be sufficiently resourced to provide automatically for children with dyslexia. This will ensure a speedy and efficient response to such difficulties. Most importantly, it will ensure that all children with have equal access to the resources they need, regardless of their socio-economic circumstances. I thank the Deputy once again for raising this matter in the House.