Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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60. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will provide an update on the preparations being undertaken by her Department and the National Council for Special Education for admissions to special schools and special classes in September 2023; if it has forecasted the number of places that will be required; and if all parties are now beginning to analyse where it may be necessary to make use of legislation to compel schools rather than waiting until late spring. [58462/22]

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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Bearing in mind the discussion on special education on RTÉ, where we need to get to with special schools and special classes is not where we were in the past couple of years, which involved panic in April and May over where children would go. I have already been contacted by parents about September 2023, and some were worried about September 2024. We need to ensure the forecasting is right and that we can wrap this up early this year, or early in the spring, so we do not have panic. I want an update on that from the Minister of State.

Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this. We debated a lot of these points already on radio. I did not get the opportunity to mention the National Council for Special Education, NCSE. I did mention the extra €30 million in funding that we secured for it in the budget, but the reason it is pertinent to this question is that the council will now be in a position to hire new special educational needs organisers, SENOs. One of the things that strikes me when travelling around meeting school staff and principals is that they have had difficulty on some occasions over communication with SENOs. They comprise a critical link between families and schools. We need more SENOs. The NCSE is going to be in a position to hire an extra 160 staff. It is in the process of recruiting them. They will really help in the shorter and longer term in mitigating the problem of the last-minute rush that the Deputy correctly stated occurred in the past, whereby there was a scramble to obtain an appropriate placement, be it in a special school or special class. I wished to reiterate that because it very much reflects what is happening on the ground from an operational perspective.

John Kearney, the new CEO of the NCSE, is doing an awful lot to make sure those lines of communication are kept open. In fairness to SENOs, there was only one SENO for every 55 schools in the past. That is a huge caseload and, with the best will in the world, it has been very difficult for them to have to constantly update families as to the status of the process. I hope that will make a significant difference and ameliorate the situation.

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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I will take this opportunity to go to the parish pump. If we are recruiting SENOs, I wish to state that there is an absence of them in my area. The Minister of State might take note of that.

There is a shared objective, namely, that we do not have a scramble every year. There are almost 1 million children in our 4,000 schools and there is easily the capacity to accommodate these children, provided we plan early enough to ensure every child has an appropriate school place. We are not yet at that point, but that can be achieved not too far into the future. To achieve that, we need to have early forecasting. Do the NCSE and the Department have a number, even an estimate, of the number of children who will require special classes or schools in September 2023? If they have those figures, what are they? If not, when will they have them?

Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Regarding SENOs in Cork, I can make inquiries. There are 63 new special classes in Cork this year, out of the 600 special classes we opened in primary schools this year, along with the 300 classes in post-primary schools and five special schools opened over the past three years.

In terms of numbers, it is critical that the NCSE is aware of children who require an appropriate placement, and this is where SENOs come in. I refer to one of the difficulties in the past, of which the Deputy may be aware. A child who has received a different professional assessment, or for reasons of parental preference, may move from a mainstream to a special class or vice versaor from a special class to a special school. It can be interchangeable. Some schools were not informing the NCSE of that. For this reason, it was under the misconception that there was capacity in circumstances where there was not. That issue has now been addressed.

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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I am aware of the number of schools in Cork with places. As is the case everywhere else, there is a significant discrepancy between what is available in primary and post-primary schools. One of the biggest challenges we need to address is the number of places in post-primary education.

One of the most frustrating issues to deal with is people who are looking for places in post-primary schools, and whether the NCSE or local schools have provided enough places. Parents have children who are 12 years of age, have had diagnoses and have been in the school system for years. They do not understand how the Department or NCSC could not know that their children need places. It is very hard to dispute that. The Minister of State did not have an opportunity to address that in the time available. Do the NCSE and Department have a figure, even an indicative one to the closest 100 or whatever, for the number of places available? If they have that information, what is the figure? If they do not have it, when will they have it? That is crucial to making decisions around section 37A.

Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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They are, of course, aware of the numbers. They change on a daily basis, as the Deputy can appreciate. That is why we have all of the forecasting measures, which I outlined to the Deputy. For the sake of the House, we are bringing forward a number of different strategic initiatives. The geographical information system, GIS, through the planning and building unit, is now sharing real-time capacity information with the NCSE. There is updated technical guidance for building reconfiguration. There is future-proofing at post-primary level.

I mentioned that I have written a letter to all post-primary schools in recent weeks stating that we will expect them to open at least four special classes in each post-primary school over the next five years. Not all of them will have to open special classes next September, but they will need to do so in future. There are 1,803 special classes at primary level and 704 at post-primary level. We will need more in the post-primary sector, as the Deputy said, over the next few years.