Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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634. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will urgently intervene to fund a school (details supplied) in County Clare that is constantly struggling to make ends meet; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [11377/25]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The Department is committed to providing funding to recognised primary and post-primary schools in the Free Education Scheme by way of per capita grants. The two main grants are the Capitation grant to cater for day-to-day running costs such as heating, lighting, cleaning, insurance and general up-keep, and the Ancillary grant to cater for the cost of employing ancillary services staff. Schools have the flexibility to use capitation funding provided for general running costs and ancillary funding provided for caretaking and secretarial services as a common grant from which the Board of Management can allocate according to its own priorities, except for cases where a secretary is now paid from the Department’s payroll as per Circular 0036/2022.

The current standard rate of Capitation grant is €200 per pupil in primary schools and the Ancillary grant is €173 per pupil in primary schools.

Primary schools with fewer than 60 pupils are paid the Capitation and the Ancillary grants on the basis of having 60 pupils.

As part of the capitation package in Budget 2025 the Department is pleased to have secured over €30 million as a permanent increase in capitation funding to assist schools now and longer term with increased day-to-day running costs. This represents an increase of circa 12% on current standard rates and enhanced rates. This increase is on top of the circa 9.2% increase from last year’s budget. This will bring the standard rate of Capitation grant to the level of €224 per pupil in primary schools per student from September 2025. Enhanced rates will also be paid in respect of pupils with special educational needs and Traveller pupils.

Following the acceptance by Fórsa of the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) agreement in respect of salaries and various leave entitlements for grant-funded school secretaries, those secretaries who accepted the terms of this agreement were placed on a payroll operated by the Department from September 2023. Therefore, ancillary-related grant funding has been revised to reflect the fact that schools are no longer paying these salaries directly.

The arrangements for Term 1 of the 2024/25 school year were based on reducing ancillary-related grants by the value of the salary that schools paid to grant-funded secretaries prior to their acceptance of the new terms and conditions. Schools provided the Department with these details and this information is now being used to reduce the ancillary-related grant funding.

Correspondence issued to all schools on 20th December 2023 providing details of these arrangements for the period September to December 2023. Further correspondence issued on 26th April 2024 setting out the position for the period January to August 2024 and again on 14th of November 2024 setting out the position for the period September to December 2024.

In the 2023/24 school year, and in Term 1 of the 2024/2025 school year, schools have been paid the usual ancillary grant amount, minus the amount that schools previously paid to grant-funded secretaries prior to their acceptance of the new terms and conditions. Schools should be in no way disadvantaged by this, as the grant is reduced only by the amount they previously paid to their secretaries.

Schools have been advised that ancillary-related grant funding is currently under review to identify a method of standardising the grant for the longer term where school secretaries have moved over to a Department-operated payroll.

In addition to these grants, €45 million in cost of living supports issued in November 2024, to support all recognised primary and post-primary schools in the Free Education Scheme. This additional funding, announced in Budget 2025, is designed to assist schools with increased day-to-day running costs such as heating and electricity. Schools should also ensure that they are availing of the available OGP procurement frameworks and getting best value for money for all school expenditure.

The Department have referred this school to the FSSU for support and FSSU is working with the school at present.