Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Question 155: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the amount of money that will be saved by cutting the services of special needs assistants. [21931/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I wish to inform the Deputy that there will be more Special Needs Assistant (SNA) posts this year than there were last year. There is therefore no estimated budget saving. 10,575 whole time equivalent (WTE) posts are being provided for SNA support for the coming school year. This is a significant number of posts and unlike other areas of the public sector vacancies are being filled up to this number. It is considered that with equitable and careful management and distribution of these resources that there should be sufficient posts to provide access to SNA support for all children who require such care support to attend school, in accordance with Departmental criteria.

I wish to advise the Deputy that the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) is responsible, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs) for allocating resource teachers and SNAs to schools to support children with special educational needs. The NCSE operates within my Department's criteria in allocating such support. This now includes a requirement for the NCSE to have regard to an overall cap on the number of SNA posts.

The NCSE has issued a circular to all schools advising of the allocation process for the 2011/2012 school year. A key feature of the amended scheme will be to provide for an annual allocation of SNA support to eligible schools.

The NCSE asked schools to submit all applications for SNA support to them by 18th March, 2011 and are currently in the process of informing schools of their annual SNA allocation for the coming school year.

In order to manage this limited resource, 475 of these posts will be retained for allocation over the coming school year to address significant emergency cases; new entrants with special needs; or new assessments or injuries acquired during the school year.

The NCSE will advise schools early in the new school year of a review process to review allocation decisions to ensure that correct procedures were followed and that they comply with my Department's policy. The merits of individual allocation decisions will not be open to appeal under this mechanism.

It will be expected that schools, before requesting a review, will be in a position to demonstrate that they have made every effort to manage their allocation of SNA posts to best effect.