Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 552: To ask the Minister for Education and Science her plans to ensure that the National Educational Psychological Service provides its services to adults. [12371/07]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I can inform the Deputy that the National Educational Psychological Service was established in 1999 to provide services to primary and post-primary schools nationally. It does not provide such services to adults. Schools have access to psychological assessments either directly through the National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS) or through the Scheme for Commissioning Psychological Assessments (SCPA). 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. Currently the NEPS service is provided nationally to some 47% of Primary schools (representing 58% of pupils) and 77% of post-primary schools (and 77% of students) nationally. Since the establishment of the NEPS in 1999, the number of NEPS psychologists has increased from 43 to 127 at present. I have recently been pleased to announce an increase of 31 posts in 2007 in NEPS psychologist staffing. Additionally under the Towards 2016 Agreement commitments I have further announced that NEPS psychologist numbers shall expand by a further 35 posts in the following two years. It is envisaged that these appointments will allow for further expansion of coverage by NEPS psychologists to schools across all regions. There are no plans to expand the ambit of the service to include adults.