Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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Question 314: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of section 29 appeals taken to her Department on a county basis; the number of cases where the appeal was upheld; the number where the appeal was rejected; the measures that are taken by her Department to ensure that the appeals mechanism is consistently applied throughout the entire county to ensure that all matters regarding the important process is consistently applied and rigorously enforced; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [7444/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The information requested by the Deputy on a county by county basis is not readily available within my Department and would involve an inordinate amount of administrative time to compile. However, I can inform the Deputy that in 2006 and 2007 a total of 266 and 383 appeals respectively were dealt with by my Department under Section 29 of the Education Act, 1998. These figures cover both first and second level students. The position in relation to 2006 is that 65 appeals were withdrawn. A further 15 appeals were resolved by local agreement and 22 were resolved by an independent facilitator. The remaining 161 cases were heard by an appeals committee and of these 73 were upheld in favour of the student.

In 2007, 81 appeals were withdrawn. A further 20 appeals were resolved by local agreement and 64 were resolved by an independent facilitator. The remaining 218 cases were heard by an appeals committee and of these 88 were upheld in favour of the appellant. All appeals under section 29 of the Education Act 1998 are dealt with in accordance with the "Procedures for Hearing and Determining appeals" which issued under Circular M48/01 in 2001. These procedures are available on my Department's web site at www.education.gov.ie. The procedures are universally applied regardless of the geographic location of any appeal.