Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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Question 415: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the names of primary schools in each county that will lose a teacher due to her Department's failure to honour a commitment in the programme for Government to reduce the staffing schedule for 2008 and 2009 from 27 to 26 pupils. [10475/08]

Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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Question 416: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the names of primary schools in each county that will not be permitted to appoint a teacher that would otherwise have been entitled to do so had her Department honoured the commitment in the programme for Government to reduce the staffing schedule for 2008 and 2009 from 27 to 26 pupils. [10476/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 415 and 416 together.

The Department has published the staffing schedule for the 2008/2009 school year. Given the increased enrolments in primary schools generally, the application of the schedule is likely to result in an increase of over 600 mainstream teaching posts for primary schools in the next school year. Approximately 120 posts will be lost in schools that had less pupils enrolled on 30 September 2007 than on 30 September 2006. It should be noted that only 50 of these posts would have been retained by the schools concerned if the schedule had been reduced from a general rule of one classroom teacher for every 27 children to one for 26.

While the IT system used to determine the staffing entitlement of each school can identify the 120 posts referred to above, and can determine that only about 50 would have been retained if the schedule was adjusted, it cannot generate a specific list of the location of these 50 posts. Compiling this list would require an examination of each of the 120 posts, which would take an inordinate amount of administrative time. I would like to point out that the Government has made provision for approximately 1,200 extra primary and post-primary teachers to be appointed in the next school year. These include the net increase of circa 500 teachers referred to above and others who will be employed in special education and language support posts.

The Deputy will be aware that Budget 2008 provided €4.6 billion or €380 million extra for teacher pay and pensions. This is a very substantial level of additional investment in the current economic environment and reflects the huge improvements that have been made in school staffing in recent years. There are now 6,000 more primary school teachers than there were in 2002. With the extra teachers put in the current school year and those planned for 2008/09, we are ahead of target in relation to the Programme for Government commitment to hire 4,000 extra primary teachers between 2007 and 2012. Indeed, 2,000 of these will be in place by next Spring.

Over the lifetime of the Government, we are committed to providing more primary school teachers specifically to reduce class sizes. We will also continue our focus on measures to improve the quality of education in our primary schools to ensure that increased resources lead to better outcomes for our children. An independent staffing appeals process is available to Boards of Management of individual schools. They can submit an appeal under certain criteria to an Appeal Board which was established to adjudicate on appeals on mainstream staffing allocations in primary schools. Details of the criteria and application dates for appeal are contained in the staffing schedule. The Appeal Board operates independently of the Department and its decision is final.

Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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Question 417: To ask the Minister for Education and Science when she will commence section 30 of the Teaching Council Act 2001; and the arrangements she will put in place to ensure that schools have access to trained substitute teachers. [10477/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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My Department is working closely with the Teaching Council to ensure that the Council is in a position to fully discharge the relevant functions of the Teaching Council Act in advance of the commencement of the corresponding sections of the Act. The remaining sections, including Section 30, will be commenced when it is feasible to do so. My Department continually monitors the situation in relation to retirements, demographics and the many other factors affecting supply and demand of teachers, in the light of system needs and available resources.

I am satisfied that my Department will take the necessary steps to enable the future demand and need for teachers to be met. The Deputy might be interested to note that, in this context, my Department approved an additional 210 places for the current intake to the Post graduate Diploma in Education (Primary), commencing February 2008.