Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)
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Question 152: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the average caseload per officer at the National Educational Welfare Board; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [32712/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The Education (Welfare) Act 2000 established the National Educational Welfare Board as the single national body with responsibility for school attendance. The general functions of the board are to ensure that each child attends a recognised school or otherwise receives a certain minimum education. To discharge its responsibilities, the board is developing a nationwide service that is accessible to schools, parents-guardians and others concerned with the welfare of young people. For this purpose, educational welfare officers, EWOs, have been appointed and deployed throughout the country to provide a welfare-focused service to support regular school attendance and discharge the board's functions locally.

The service is developing on a continuing basis. The total authorised staffing complement is 94, comprising 16 headquarters and support staff, five regional managers, 12 senior educational welfare officers, SEWOs, and 61 educational welfare officers, EWOs. Towns which have an educational welfare officer allocated to them include Dundalk, Drogheda, Navan, Athlone, Carlow, Kilkenny, Wexford, Bray, Clonmel, Tralee, Ennis, Sligo, Naas, Castlebar, Longford, Tuam, Tullamore, Letterkenny and Portlaoise. In addition, the board will follow up on urgent cases nationally where children are not receiving an education. Since September 2005 every county in Ireland is served by an educational welfare service.

The board has indicated to my Department that the average caseload of each educational welfare officer as at September 2005 was about 108. This has reduced from the July average of 164 arising from the filling of the ten additional EWO posts. The board is continually reviewing the protocols for prioritising children and families who require intervention to ensure that children with greatest need gain maximum benefit from available resources and working with local agencies in prioritising children's and family needs.

In this regard, there are some 490 staff in education disadvantage programmes whose work involves a school attendance element. My Department is anxious to ensure that the maximum benefit is derived from these substantial personnel resources. Consequently work is ongoing to develop appropriate protocols for integrated working between the different services involved.