Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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312. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the cost of resourcing special needs in primary schools on an individualised basis without any caps on hours or staff. [27488/16]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that funding for special education provision in 2016 will amount to some €1.5 billion, which is equivalent to over 17% of the gross overall current allocation for education and training. It has increased by 10% in the past two years.

The investment which is being made to support children with special educational needs is an area of spending which has been prioritised above most other areas by this Government.

The policy of my Department is that children with special educational needs should be included where possible and appropriate in mainstream placements with additional supports provided. In circumstances where children with special educational need require more specialised interventions, special school or special class places are also available.

Children, therefore, have a number of placement options including mainstream placement with support, placement in a special class in a mainstream school or placement in a special class in a special school.

It should be noted that we now have the highest level of Special Needs Assistant (SNA) and Resource Teaching support that we have ever had, as the number of posts which may be allocated to schools in order to support valid applications for children for this provision, in accordance with my Departments criteria, has been increased annually in recent years to meet the actual demand from schools.

The Deputy will be aware that I recently announced 12,900 Special Needs Assistants (SNAs) will be available for allocation to primary and secondary schools for the 2016/17 school year, which is 860 more posts, or a 7% increase, in the number of posts over which were available last year.

In total the number of SNA posts available has increased by almost 22%, from 10,575 posts available in 2011.

The number of resource teaching posts which may be allocated to schools has also increased again this year.

In May of this year, the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) allocated 7,015 Resource Teaching posts to mainstream schools for September 2016, which is an increase of approximately 9% over the number allocated at September 2015.

In total, 7,452 resource teacher posts will be available for allocation to schools for 2016/17, which represents an increase of 41%, from 5265 posts available in 2011.

In addition, approximately 150 new Special Classes will be opened for the 2016/17 school year, which means there will be over 1,150 special classes in place, compared to 548 special classes in 2011.

125 special schools also provide specialist education for those pupils who need it and additional staffing is provided for special schools annually to support additional enrolments.

The provision which is being made ensures that children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education and be supported in a manner appropriate to their needs.

Funding for the provision of special educational needs supports has been increased annually in recent years to meet the demand form schools, to support the assessed needs of children with individual special educational needs, in accordance with my Departments allocation criteria. 

I am therefore satisfied that the provision which is being made in 2016,  of approximately €1.5 billion, will be sufficient to meet demand from schools in 2016, and that this provision has not been curtailed by a cap on hours and staff, given the increases in SNA and resource teaching staff which have been provided to meet actual demand this year.

I can also confirm that this Government will continue to ensure that the supports required to ensure that all children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education will be provided.