Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein)
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785. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the number of children with additional needs in County Westmeath who are currently without a suitable school place for the upcoming academic year. [44874/25]

Michael Moynihan (Cork North-West, Fianna Fail)
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The National Council for Special Education (NCSE) is the national agency with responsibility for the provision of special education places. This year the NCSE has sanctioned 407 new special classes for the 2025/26 school year bringing to 3,741 the number of special classes in our schools. There are new classes in every county in Ireland and with the number of special classes doubling in the last five years, this now means that there are more classes than ever ensuring greater numbers of children can access places in their local school. Furthermore the number of special class places in our schools will exceed demand.

Combined with over 300 new special school places this brings to over 2,700 the number of new school places for children with special educational needs. Of the 407 new special classes that have been sanctioned for the 2025/26 school year, 292 are at primary and 115 at post primary level. Of these 10 are in County Westmeath, 7 at primary and 3 at post primary level.

This brings to 79 the number of special classes currently in operation in the county. There are also 4 special schools in Westmeath with approximately 220 students enrolled.

The NCSE has advised that just under 3,300 valid notifications were received by mid-February via their new parent notify service. Some of these notifications were children already known to the NCSE however, many others were new. Also, while parents were asked to notify the NCSE by mid-February the NCSE continues to receive notifications and continues to review reports and recommendations for specialist placement as appropriate.

The NCSE has advised my department that the vast majority of children seeking a special school or special class place have now been assigned a school place. They are working very closely with the remaining families in Dublin to ensure that they are being kept updated as the remaining special class and special school places are being finalised by a small number of schools.

This year, the approach taken was to maximise the use of existing accommodation in schools to ensure new special classes could open as quickly as possible for the 2025/26 school year. The NCSE also prioritised schools which did not have an existing special class. ?This has ensured that 80% of the new classes sanctioned are in schools with available accommodation.

Where schools require modular accommodation for new special classes, these projects are being fast-tracked by my department to deliver this accommodation as early as possible. In a small number of instances where a delay in new special class accommodation is expected such as where new modular classrooms are being provided, contingency arrangements are being made with the relevant schools with the support of the NCSE.

My department and the NCSE are committed to ensuring that sufficient special education placements will be available for children for the coming school year and future years.