Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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91. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will provide an update on the progress of the €5 million pilot programme of counselling and well-being and mental health supports for the academic years 2024-25; to provide a breakdown of the progress in Cork in particular; if there are plans to expand the programme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [40008/25]

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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I ask the Minister for to provide an

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I thank Deputy Burke for raising this matter. This is an important pilot programme that has been rolled out.

My Department is committed to supporting the emotional well-being of our children. In 2023, the establishment of a €5 million pilot programme of counselling and mental health supports for primary schools was announced. In budget 2025, the pilot received additional funding which has allowed it to continue into this year. It is broken up into two different strands.

Strand 1 is the provision of one-to-one counselling to support small numbers of children in schools. These are in counties Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan and Tipperary. We have panels of pre-approved private counsellors in place to provide counselling and there are currently 45 counsellors available. In the 2023-24 school year, more than 2,800 counselling sessions took place and 371 children – I am pleased to say - availed of counselling provision. In the 2024-25 school year, which has just finished, more than 5,600 counselling sessions took place and at least 653 children have availed of counselling provision. Again, it is really wonderful to see those numbers increase.

Strand 2 of the pilot is the establishment of education well-being teams to support 78 schools in cluster areas in Cork, Carlow, Dublin 7 and 16. To date, 20 education well-being practitioners have been recruited. Five education well-being practitioners provide weekly support to the 20 schools in the Cork strand 2 cluster. The focus of the support provided is on strengthening whole-school preventative approaches. This includes the provision of psycho-educational support for parents and teachers and the provision of early intervention on an individual and group basis to children with mild to emerging need using low-level therapeutically informed approaches. The schools received a payment of €2,000 to promote and support well-being-focused initiatives among their school communities.

The pilot is being externally evaluated. On strand 2 in particular, which applies to Cork, there has been really positive feedback from the schools, parents and children involved, giving support to the schools so they can support every single child. While the one-to-one counselling is really important here, there is positive feedback from the broader practitioner work that is happening.

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister and welcome the success of this scheme. I am concerned, however, about whether it will continue. On Monday last, I met with Barnardos in Knocknaheeny in Cork where a programme is based. As the Minister will know, Barnardos total budget for the year is approximately €15 million. It gets €12 million through Tusla and there is a shortfall of approximately €3 million, which it is challenging. Barnardos does similar projects and meets a number of people to give support to children who are going to school and giving support to parents. I very much welcome this programme is in place and hope it continues. I ask the Minister to outline what the intentions are in respect of rolling it out to the areas I represent in Cork city. What are the long-term plans for this whole area? This is an essential programme, especially the provision of support to parents.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I agree with Deputy Burke that any way in which we can provide support to our students at any age or level should be welcomed. It is my intention to continue the work on strands 1 and 2 in the areas under the pilot scheme, to put this programme in place as quickly as possible and to try to expand it further.

That comes down to measures and what can be achieved in the budget, and this something I will be working on over the coming weeks with our colleague, the Minister, Deputy Chambers. I do see the benefits of it. While, as I said, the evaluation report is still under way and will be completed by September, we are already getting really positive feedback. What we must ask is whether we are rolling out both strands, where there is the direct, one-to-one counselling, or whether it would be better to roll out the broader supports being provided through the well-being practitioners. It is then about ensuring we have the staff to do it. While we have 45 counsellors under the first panel and the strand, to expand this across the whole country would obviously be greatly intensive in terms of just identifying and finding the practitioners to do it. All this must be evaluated and looked at, but it is certainly something I am open to looking at.

John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I ask those in the Public Gallery to please leave quietly. I call Deputy Colm Burke.

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister. One of the issues I raised concerned Barnardos and the work it is doing. These are two separate programmes, but this is about co-ordination and working together. It is extremely important that this happens. The work the Department is doing means it has now acquired a great deal of expertise. It is the same with Barnardos and what it is doing. It also has a large amount of expertise. It is about pooling it and delivering a comprehensive service in areas and giving support. I must compliment the Department on the amount of work it has done in this area. In real terms, while it is spending €5 million, it is a huge saving in the long term for the State. All these projects really benefit the children and families and the State in the long term in respect of assisting people at a very early age.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I agree with the Deputy regarding the importance of being able to support young people early, especially where we know issues are emerging. It is crucial, most importantly, to the young people, but also to our society as a whole. I agree with the Deputy as well that it is important that in the evaluation, we are looking at the work of those in strands 1 and 2, but perhaps also at how they are also working with other organisations. I will check to see that this is a part of the evaluation because it is really important all the different strands, organisations and agencies are working together and collaborating insofar as possible. This is certainly something I will do.

This is a pilot for our primary schools but important work is also happening in our second schools as well and this is something that is more nationwide. In addition to the counselling pilot, my Department, in partnership with Jigsaw, which we all know is an extremely important organisation in our communities, has a national programme of mental health and well-being resources and training for post-primary schools known as Neart. It is being rolled out. I only officially launched it at the beginning of my term - I think it was in March or April. At that stage already, because it had been available to schools, there was a really high take-up by schools. In one of the schools in my area, I was able to see the benefits it has had already where students engaged with the programme and who were then able to give peer-to-peer support - transition year students with first year students. A great deal of good work is happening and we obviously want to see this expanded.