Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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Question 122: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the proposals she has to assist families, especially those on low incomes, with the escalating cost of school books; her plans to increase the funding available under the aid for school books grant scheme and the book rental scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [21612/07]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to continue to operate grant schemes towards the cost of providing school textbooks for pupils from low-income families at primary and post-primary level and to provide additional funding as resources permit. Schools are notified of the details of the schemes each year by circular letter.

For the purposes of these grants, a needy pupil is a pupil from a family where there is genuine hardship because of unemployment, prolonged illness of a parent, large family size with inadequate means, singe parenthood, or other family circumstances (such as substance abuse) which would indicate a similar degree of financial hardship.

Principal teachers administer the book grant schemes in schools in a flexible way under the terms of the schemes based on their knowledge of particular circumstances in individual cases.

At primary level a total of €5,350,000 — an increase of €1,350,000 on the allocation for the 2005/06 school year — was allocated in respect of the school books scheme in the 2006/2007 school year. The allocation for 2006/2007 included an amount of €0.5m which was made available under the School Books Grant Scheme to primary schools in the School Support Programme (SSP) under DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools), the new action plan for educational inclusion. An additional €0.25m has been provided for this purpose in 2007. The allocation for 2007 is €5,877,000.

Schools participating in the SSP that indicated that they would operate a book/loan rental scheme in 2006/2007 received grant aid at a higher rate per eligible pupil than applied in the case of schools generally. The extra funding is aimed at supporting the establishment, development and ongoing operation of book loan/rental schemes.

This schemes provides assistance towards the cost of school books thereby ensuring that pupils from low-income families will have access to all necessary books at a nominal fee or even free of charge.

Approximately 142,000 primary school pupils were assisted under the scheme in 2006.

At second level, in addition to the provision of grants towards the cost of providing school textbooks for needy pupils, my Department also provides seed capital funding to certain schools in order to assist in the establishment of book loan/rental schemes. These would be schools designated as disadvantaged or which participate in schemes aimed at combating educational disadvantage.

School returns furnished to my Department to date show that approximately 132,000 pupils at second level were assisted under the scheme in the 2006/2007 school year.

Expenditure on the School Books Grant Scheme in second-level schools in 2006 was €7.518m, of which some €0.8m was provided for the establishment/ongoing support of book loan/rental schemes.

The 2007 allocation is €7.941m and €0.9m of this has been allocated for book loan/rental schemes.

As I indicated already the question of providing additional funding under the school books grant scheme will be considered in the context of available resources.