Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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Question 63: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of extra educational psychologists who will be appointed in the context of the recently published Government Estimates 2007; the locations where they will be deployed; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [40167/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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All primary and post primary schools have access to psychological assessments either directly through the NEPS or through the Scheme for Commissioning Psychological Assessments (SCPA), full details of which are available on my Department's website.

Schools that do not currently have NEPS psychologists assigned to them may avail of the SCPA, whereby the school can have an assessment carried out by a member of the panel of private psychologists approved by NEPS, and NEPS will pay the psychologist the fees for this assessment directly.

Details of this process and the conditions that apply to the scheme are available on my Department's Website. The prioritisation of urgent cases for assessment is a matter for the school principal in the first instance. In the 10 months to the end of October 2006, nearly €1.2 million was spent on in region of 3,500 SCPA assessments.

The NEPS service is locally based and regionally organised with a small national Head Office. Currently, the NEPS service is now available to approximately 1,604 primary schools (representing approximately 60% of pupils) and approximately 586 post-primary schools (representing 78% of students). This number includes 46 schools in the City and County of Dublin Vocational Schemes, which have their own psychological service.

In common with many other psychological services, NEPS encourages a staged assessment process, whereby each school takes responsibility for initial assessment, educational planning and remedial intervention in consultation with their assigned NEPS psychologist. Only if there is a failure to make reasonable progress in spite of the school's best efforts will a child be referred for individual psychological assessment. This system allows the psychologists to give early attention to urgent cases and also to help many more children indirectly than could be seen individually. It also ensures that children are not referred unnecessarily for psychological intervention.

The introduction of the General Allocation Model for primary schools last year, supported by the provision of over 600 extra resource teachers, means that children with high incidence special needs no longer have to wait for an individual assessment before they can get access to extra support.

Since the establishment of NEPS, the number of psychologists in the service has increased from 43 to 127 at present (including 4 psychologists currently seconded to the National Behavioural Support Service). In the last recruitment round, regional panels were used to allow my Department give greater priority in filling vacancies to areas with the greatest need.

In addition to the 127 psychologists currently in NEPS, a further 6 are in the process of being recruited. On top of this, the 17% increase in funding for the service provided in the 2007 Estimates, will allow some further expansion in the number of psychologists next year. The actual number of extra staff will be determined shortly.

To conclude, since this Government established NEPS, we have trebled the number of psychologists in the service. We have also funded in the region of 3,500 private assessments so far this year.

We are committed to expanding the coverage of the service even further, are recruiting extra staff at present and plan to hire more in 2007.