Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for bringing forward this valuable Bill. I watched the full debate on the Stages of the Bill in the Dáil. I point out all of the Topical Issue matters, all of the parliamentary questions, all of the oral parliamentary questions and all of the Commencement matters the Minister of State does on top of all of the other work she does all of the time to advance the case for children with additional educational needs.

There is no question that this is urgent legislation. The Minister of State knows of and has kindly met with groups like the Dublin 12 autism advocacy group and Involve Autism just to see how not having places has such an effect on children and on whole families, including parents and siblings. Involve Autism has had a number of public meetings, and the Minister of State addressed the most recent one herself. In that context, at the first meeting, we heard from parents who had put in 30 to 40 applications for places for their child and they still did not know if their child was going to get a place in a school anywhere near their home. In this year, I have been working with the Minister of State’s office and we have heard of situations of children in Drimnagh being offered places in Blessington. That is not sustainable for any quality of life for the child because their friends are not going to be local friends. Places need to be as local as possible. I support how strongly the Minister of State has come out and advocated for that, including naming, where necessary. We have had instances – people have come to the Minister of State and I have supported that - where entities have been economical with the truth when it comes to availability and the possibility of putting in classes. It is very important we ensure that happens.

I welcome the commitment of the NCSE and the Minister of State's assertion of the NCSE’s commitment. A representative from the NCSE was at the Involve Autism meeting and, to be fair, took it on the chin. There was a lot of criticism, particularly of special educational needs organisers, SENOs, in that their role does not appear to be properly defined, or if it is defined, it is not meeting that. Giving parents a list of schools is not supporting them in finding a place for their children. That is very important.

A further issue is that the people who are making decisions in schools are the boards of management and, at times, there is no transparency as to who those people are. In the early autumn, I will be bringing forward a Private Members’ Bill to ensure that level of transparency because it is important we know who is making the decision on whether a child is in or out of a school.