Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 26 Jun 2024

I move:

That Dáil Éireann:

notes:

— that our pupil teacher ratio is 22.8 pupils per class size, whereas the European Union average is 20 pupils per class;

— that there is chronic underfunding in Government expenditure per student in our primary schools, which is equivalent to 13 per cent per capita Gross Domestic Product, while the Organisation for economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average is 27 per cent per capita, leaving Ireland last out of 36 developed countries for spending on education, as per an OECD report;

— a recent survey carried out by the Catholic Primary Schools Management Association in April 2024, which reported that schools have seen their energy costs increased by over 35 per cent in the last two years, while insurance costs increased by 19 per cent over the same period, and seven out of 10 primary schools have run at a deficit at some stage over the past 12 months;

— that in reality the Capitation Grant barely covers energy and electricity costs, with little or no funding left to cover all the other costs involved in running a school including, but not limited to, refuse disposal costs, stationery and teaching resources, bank charges, Irish Water charges, accounting fees, payroll and administrative costs, costs related to health and safety provision, the impact of the reduction in the Primary School Free Books Scheme, the disappearance of the ICT Grant scheme, the cut of €15 per pupil in the Summer Programme Grant and the decrease in the Ancillary Services Grant;

— the need for schools to fundraise just to pay bills, and that fundraising is more difficult in areas of greater deprivation, and in smaller rural schools;

— the increased pressure on school principals who are suffering burnout at a worrying rate; and

— that despite this chronic level of underinvestment, 15-year-old Irish pupils score among the highest on the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment, which clearly indicates the quality of teaching and the ability of our students;

further notes:

— that the number of children with special needs in primary education increased by 56 per cent between 2017 and 2021;

— that over 16,500 children are awaiting their first appointment with the Children's Disability Network Team (CDNT), as these teams have a national staff vacancy rate of over 30 per cent;

— that 19,500 children are awaiting an assessment of need, further adding to the difficulties that Special Education Needs (SEN) pupils are facing in schools;

— the severe lack of SEN supports, with Special Education Teachers (SET) allocations frozen or cut between 2017 and 2021, while Special Needs Assistant (SNA) allocations have also been largely frozen;

— that additional supports are only granted following extremely burdensome exceptional reviews or appeals mechanisms, where the majority of these were not upheld;

— that despite a new SET model being introduced in 2024, the criterion of "complex needs" has been removed from assessments and many SEN mainstream pupils will not be recognised as needing supports until at least 2nd class;

— that schools have no efficient or timely mechanism for reporting their SEN needs to the Department of Education or the National Council for Special Education, which can result in SET allocations being based on incomplete data which could easily be rectified by asking principals to input this information on their Pupil Online Database (POD) annually;

— the number of children with special needs and their families who are still desperately seeking school places for September 2024;

— that there are over 45,000 children on the CDNT teams across the country; and

— that the crisis in the recruitment and retention of teachers across our education system has a greater adverse effect on SEN pupils; and

calls on the Government to:

— commit to aligning primary educational funding with the OECD average;

— ensure the Ancillary Grant is sufficient to cover the cost of running a school;

— ensure the 2024 SET allocation model reflects current needs and individual profiling, urgently reassesses the reinstatement of "complex needs" as a criterion, and immediately put in place an extension to the POD to ensure real time and accurate data regarding pupils with special needs;

— ensure the educational component of Assessment of Needs is completed by a qualified educational psychologist, with assistance from schools;

— enforce the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004, so that schools can access legislative recourse to ensure their pupils receive the necessary SEN supports to meet their individual needs;

— allocate sufficient resources and supports to schools that are integrating refugee and asylum-seeking children;

— bring forward an action plan to better support school principals and to increase the administrative time for teaching principals, as well as fully reinstating the numbers of assistant principals back to pre-austerity levels;

— bring forward an action plan with resources and timelines to address the chronic teacher supply shortage in our education system; and

— consider allowing schools to benefit from Value Added Tax (VAT) exemptions or VAT compensation schemes.

I welcome the Minister, Deputy Foley. I am pleased to see her. I am also pleased to see that she has not put forward any amendments to the motion. The Minister is aware that we have received very detailed briefings from the Irish Primary Principals Network and the INTO in recent weeks on the situation regarding the severe lack of funding for primary schools. As one principal said to me: “We have been running on fumes for a few years and we are actually running out of fumes now.” The analysis that they presented to us on the situation regarding the very significant funding gaps in our primary education system is compelling and needs an immediate response from the Government.

School principals and teachers have presented us with the facts and figures to underpin their case for badly needed funding increases to run our primary schools. I have visited a number of primary schools in my constituency in recent months. I have spoken quietly with principals about their individual situations as well as the overall crisis in primary education funding. What I have seen is that schools are really struggling to pay their core bills. By core bills I mean heat, light and insurance. Money to employ a caretaker, a cleaner or whatever is not available. Principals and teachers find themselves doing these jobs. However, that is the least of it. Schools find themselves in a position where they often have to fundraise two or three times per year just to pay basic bills like refuse disposal costs, bank charges, Irish Water charges, accounting fees, payroll and administration costs and costs relating to health and safety provision. There are myriad costs involved in running schools which those involved say is not acknowledged and is not covered by departmental funding. Many schools are really struggling. While fundraising is never easy, the Minister of State and I know that it is even more difficult in areas of deprivation or, in particular, in small rural schools. There was a time when fundraising was for the little extras, namely to help pay for a bus to take students to a match or some educational function or to provide a few extra resources for those students who really needed them. That is all gone and this is putting so much pressure on schools.

A survey carried out by the Catholic Primary School Management Association in April indicates that schools have seen their energy costs increased by more than 35% in the past two years. The cost of insurance has increased by 19% over the same period. Seven out of ten of those primary schools ran at a deficit at some stage in the past 12 months. I do not know about the Minister of State but I think that is untenable and cannot be allowed to continue. We have to ask ourselves why this is happening. The figures speak for themselves. The chronic underfunding by the Government of students in our primary schools is equivalent to 13% per capita gross domestic product. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD, average is 27% per capita, leaving Ireland last out of 36 developed countries for spending on education as per a recent OECD report. Ireland has always been a country that has prided itself on the quality of its education system, especially its primary system. When you have teachers and principals telling you that their main concern for primary education is the serious level of underfunding in the sector, you know it is a real issue.

I acknowledge that the Government has made improvements to the pupil-teacher ratio during its term, but our pupil-teacher ratio is still 22.8 pupils per class whereas the European average is 20 pupils per class. So many European countries have a lower pupil-teacher ratio than Ireland. Countries with lower GDP levels have higher spending on education. One of the main asks of this motion is to bring our pupil-teacher ratio down to the EU average. That is not a big ask. It is one on which the Government could deliver in the next budget.

One point I make in the motion is that, despite the chronic level of underinvestment in primary education, 15-year-old Irish pupils score among the highest on the OECD programme for international student assessment which clearly indicates the quality of teaching in our schools and the ability of our students. The Taoiseach's response to the issue of underfunding in our primary education system last week was to quote this fact as if it somehow is a vindication of Government funding in the system. The truth is that these results, which show Irish 15-year-olds are among the highest achievers in this OECD assessment, do not relate to Government funding. As I said, Ireland is last out of 36 developed countries for spending on education according to that same OECD report. That is unless the Taoiseach is saying that the less money you spend, the better the outcomes. What he should do is give credit where it is due to the quality of teaching and the ability of our 15-year-olds despite the serious underfunding in our primary school system.

Struggling to keep schools afloat comes at a cost. Principals are suffering burnout at a worrying rate because they are under increasing pressure. They are running schools at a deficit, trying to make ends meet, relying on volunteers to help out and asking parents to contribute. None of this should be on the shoulders of principals or teachers. Their job is to teach, to manage and to concentrate all of their efforts on making schools the best they can be and giving our students the most positive educational experience possible. Many of them tell me they are operating with both hands tied behind their backs.

While the overall funding situation is critical, we also need to significantly increase the resources available to schools to ensure that students with special education needs receive an appropriate pupil-centred education, so they have a real opportunity to reach their full potential. In this context, we must deal with the reality facing pupils, parents and schools because the number of children with special needs in primary education increased by 56% between 2017 and 2021. There are more than 16,500 children awaiting their first appointment with the children's disability network team. Some of these teams have a vacancy rate of more than 30%. That is an untenable situation because both the Minister of State and I know that these children cannot wait. Every day and every week counts and matters. Early supports and diagnosis are crucial. In the context of diagnosis, there are approximately 19,500 children awaiting assessments of need. That is further adding to the difficulties special education needs pupils are facing in schools because there is a severe lack of SEN supports with special education teacher allocations frozen or cut between 2017 and 2021, while special needs assistant allocations have been largely frozen.

Principals are telling us that where additional supports are needed, as they often are, they are only granted following extremely burdensome exceptional reviews or appeals mechanisms where the majority of these are not upheld. In the 2022-23 school year, a total of 78 appeals for SNA exceptional review appeals were made. Of those, 61 were not upheld. I know from speaking to principals, the work, effort and energy that go into that because they see pupils in their schools needing those extra supports.

It is difficult to accept that this percentage is not being upheld. Principals recognise the work that they put into it and understand that the needs of their students are not being seen for what they are.

Despite a new special education teacher, SET, model being introduced in 2024, the criterion of complex needs has been removed from assessments. Every single principal I spoke to told me that this is an area of huge concern. They say that many special education mainstream pupils will not be recognised as needing supports until they are in second class. In this context, we see that 362 schools applied for an exceptional review on this matter in 2022 and only 39 were allocated an increase in SET hours.

One of the reason principals find themselves in this situation is that they say they have no efficient or timely mechanism for reporting their SEN requirements to the Department of Education or the National Council for Special Education, NCSE. This results in SET outcomes being based on incomplete data which could easily be rectified by asking principals to input this information annually on the pupil online database.

Some children with special needs and their families are still desperately seeking school places for September 2024. Over 45,000 children are being supported by children's disability network teams, CDNTs, across the country. On top of this, the crisis in the recruitment and retention of teachers across our education system has a further adverse effect on SEN pupils.

In that context, I am asking the Minister and the Government to commit to aligning primary education funding with the OECD average; to ensure the ancillary grant is sufficient to cover the cost of running a school; crucially, to ensure the 2024 SET allocation model reflects current needs and individual profiling; to urgently reassess the reinstatement of complex needs as a criterion; to put in place immediately an extension to the primary online database; and to ensure real-time and accurate data regarding pupils with special needs. There used to be a box on that database which a principal could tick, but it has disappeared. Do the Department and the NCSE not want to know this information? Yes, these bodies have data from standardised tests, etc., but this does not reflect complex needs because complex needs require more support.

We want to ensure the educational component of the assessment of needs is completed by a qualified educational psychologist with assistance from schools. We are asking the Minister to enforce the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act and to ensure sufficient resources and support are available to schools to integrate refugees and asylum-seeking children. We are asking the Minister to bring forward a better plan to support schools and school principals, to increase the administrative time for teaching principals and to reinstate the number of assistant principals back to pre-austerity levels.

I thank the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach for the opportunity to speak on this motion regarding primary school funding. I thank Deputy Harkin for proposing such an important motion today. I fully support the motion, which calls on the Government to commit to aligning primary educational funding with the OECD average to ensure the ancillary grant is sufficient to cover the cost of running schools and to enforce the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004 to ensure every child is receiving a proper education and sufficient support.

Our schools are in a dire situation at the moment. It is shocking that we rank last in terms of our investment in education of the 36 developed OECD countries. We invest 13% per capita compared to the OECD average of 27%, and this is being reflected in our schools. It has been reported that seven out of ten schools have run at a deficit at some stage over the last 12 months, which is totally unacceptable. Heating, electricity and insurance costs are squeezing school budgets. The once-off cost-of-living grant was not enough to make any real or lasting difference. It has been reported that more than half of schools are having to raise funds to cover their costs.

As if school staff do not have enough to do, they are now forced to raise funds to ensure their schools are able to function. This is an incredibly unfair burden to put on those who already contribute so much to our society. Even though the number of children with special needs in primary schools increased by 56% between 2017 and 2021, SNA and SET allocations have been frozen or cut. Allocations do not match the level of need presenting in schools and many children are slipping through the cracks.

The Government has done little to address this and has instead introduced programmes without much forethought or consultation. The hot meals programme is being extended, with the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, saying that she wants to see every primary school child in the country receiving a hot meal in 2025. However, there has been little consideration of the fact that many schools are struggling for space and facilities as it is, particularly rural schools. I have never come across a primary school with a canteen in County Donegal. I doubt that most would have the facilities for, or accessibility to, delivered meals. Primary schools are struggling to pay for cleaners as it is, meaning that the expectation will, once again, fall on teachers to facilitate and clean up after hot meals.

The Government needs to invest significantly into ensuring better facilities for our schools. Many are operating in completely unsuitable circumstances. Glebe National School in Donegal town, for example, has been waiting on a modular classroom for over a year. The application was submitted in March 2023 and it was expected that the classroom would be available in September 2023. It is now the end of the 2023-24 school year and there is still no sign of it. Over the last year children have been taught in completely unsuitable conditions. The special education teacher at the school works out of a kitchen and English as an additional language, EAL, lessons take place in a space under the stairs or in a hallway. This is what the Minister should be prioritising to ensure children and teachers have access to safe and suitable learning environments, and sufficient resources and supports are available.

It is also shocking that there is no mechanism for schools to provide feedback on who has needs within their classes. The 2024 allocation model uses outdated data from 2016 and ignores the current needs. The model relies on enrolment numbers, literacy and numeracy scores, and educational disadvantage metrics, but lacks any individual profiling. As a result, resources are allocated based on historical data but not on current needs, which is hugely problematic and leads to allocated supports that are often not helpful and do not address the actual needs present.

It has been reported that the Department will not accept individual profiling, citing the general data protection regulation, GDPR, but how can children’s needs be adequately addressed without any information about what their needs actually are? GDPR must be a godsend to the Government because it allows the blocking of any information at all being transferred across the system. This would seem to be the purpose of it at this stage. Current accurate data can easily be gathered from schools via their pupil online database or annual census returns, and this should be considered by the Minister.

There is a genuine crisis here. Our schools need massive, immediate investment. The ancillary services grant should be remedied immediately. The capitation grant should be linked to the cost of living. Teaching principals require far more support and the SET allocations model must be reviewed immediately. We also need to address the fact that 50% of DEIS band 1 schools have staff deficits and many primary rural schools are experiencing this too. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, children are coming to school with a range of different needs. Many rural schools are seeing an increase in children from war-torn countries, some with severe needs, with no staff to manage these situations or address these needs, despite these needs being well known in advance for the schools in question.

The Government is not opposing this motion.

I thank Deputy Harkin and her colleagues for tabling this motion. As I have said, the Government is not opposing it. I welcome the opportunity to speak to the House this morning on the very important matter of primary school funding and the many measures under way by the Government to support primary schools.

The issue of school funding is a very significant element of every school's operation. I am acutely aware of the matters raised in the motion concerning funding and the appropriate staffing provided to schools, especially in the context of rising energy and cost-of-living expenses generally, as well as increases in the number of students requiring special education and other interventions. I am equally conscious of the many steps taken by the Government in recent years to address these matters. I want to talk in particular today about how the Government addresses financial issues for students by providing a range of measures, increasing capitation funding, expanding the provision of free school books and taking other initiatives.

The motion before the House calls on the Government to commit to aligning primary education funding with the OECD average and ensure the ancillary grant is sufficient to cover the cost of running a school. The Department of Education provides significant funding and other supports to recognised primary and post-primary schools in the free education scheme by way of per capita grants and other resources, as evidenced by successive Government investments and initiatives aimed at providing capacity to meet day-to-day running costs, bills and other expenses and a commitment that a rise in the cost of living should never be a barrier to education. This is essential for us to deliver on our goal of enabling the provision of high-quality education and improving the learning experience to meet the needs of all children and young people in our schools.

The OECD average, as referenced by the Deputy, is taken from the annual OECD Education at a Glance report. This report uses gross domestic product as the base against which to compare investment in education across different OECD members. As Deputies will be aware, however, senior academics and other independent analysts have raised questions regarding the use of GDP as the most appropriate measure of the size of the Irish economy. To assist with this, the Department of Education published a paper on the matter in October 2022 to assist users of these statistics to understand this issue. The paper is available on www.gov.ie under OECD briefing notes. The briefing paper outlines how, using the alternative measure of gross national income, GNI, education expenditure in 2020, as a percentage of GNI, stood at 5.8%. This compares favourably to the OECD average for education expenditure as a percentage of national income, which stood at 5.1% in 2020. The document also looks at Ireland's spend on education as a percentage of total Government spending which also compares well internationally.

The two main grants provided by the Department of Education to schools are the capitation grant to cater for day-to-day running costs such as heating, lighting, cleaning, insurance and general upkeep, and the ancillary grant to cater for the cost of employing ancillary staff such as school secretaries and caretakers. In recent budgets, additional funding has been provided to schools to meet their increased running costs. This has been provided through substantial cost-of-living supports and permanent increases to the rates of capitation paid per pupil enrolled in schools. As part of the capitation package in budget 2024, €21 million was secured as a permanent increase in capitation funding to assist schools, now and in the long term, with increased day-to-day running costs. This will support a permanent restoration of funding for all primary and post-primary schools from September 2024. The standard rate of capitation grant in primary schools for the 2024-25 school year is €200 per mainstream pupil, with effect from 1 September 2024. Enhanced capitation rates are payable in respect of Traveller pupils and pupils with special education needs.

As part of the cost-of-living measures introduced in budget 2024, €60 million was provided in additional funding to support increased running costs for recognised primary and post-primary schools in the free education scheme, particularly in dealing with challenges they face in light of rising energy costs. This funding is in addition to the €90 million in budget 2023 as a cost-of-living measure. In recent years, the Department has ensured centrally negotiated rates were made available to schools for electricity and bulk heating fuels through frameworks sourced by the Office of Government Procurement. Central rates are fixed for gas and electricity for those availing of those arrangements. These are open to all schools and I strongly encourage schools to avail of these savings.

There have been changes to the ancillary grant paid to schools this year, as referenced, to take account of the fact that certain schools no longer have certain pay costs to meet from that grant. This is because, following the acceptance by Fórsa of the Workplace Relations Commission agreement in respect of salaries and various leave entitlements for grant-funded school secretaries, those secretaries who accepted the terms of this agreement have been placed on a payroll operated by the Department of Education. Therefore, as schools will no longer be responsible for paying the salaries of these secretaries, it was necessary to revise the ancillary grant funding to take account of this change. Schools will not be paying the school secretaries directly; the Department will pay them. In the 2023-24 school year, schools have been paid the usual ancillary grant amount minus the amount they previously paid to grant-funded secretaries prior to their acceptance of the new terms and conditions. Schools are in no way disadvantaged by this as the grant is only reduced by the amount they previously paid to their secretaries, which they no longer have to pay.

Schools have been advised that work and engagement is ongoing to identify a method of standardising the reduction to the ancillary grants for the longer term where school secretaries are being paid by a payroll operated by the Department. As part of budget 2023, more than €50 million was allocated to provide free school books to primary school children and young people within the free education scheme from the start of the 2023-24 school year. This scheme is a permanent measure. More than 563,000 children benefited from this programme in its first year of operation. In the next school year, 555,000 children will benefit. The digital strategy for schools to 2027, published in 2022, is underpinned by an investment of €200 million over its lifetime which has been committed to under Ireland's national development plan. To date, under the digital strategy for schools, a total investment of €310 million has been issued to all recognised primary and post-primary schools in ICT grant funding. Schools have autonomy and flexibility in how they invest this particular funding. Funding of €50 million secured as part of Ireland's national recovery and resilience plan under the NextGeneration EU Recovery and Resilience Facility, RRF, has also been issued to all recognised schools in the free education schemes to support learners at risk of educational disadvantage through the digital divide.

A full budget allocation of €40 million, equal to that available in recent years, is available for the summer programme. As in previous years, all of the funding is utilised to meet the needs of our most vulnerable children. A key barrier to the participation of schools, following the reviews carried out, is the availability of staff, particularly those staff already working in the schools. Therefore, this year for the summer programme, to maximise the use of the summer programme budget, teachers and SNAs working on the school-based scheme will be given their personal rate of pay as distinct from the basic rate of pay which was previously the case. Consequently, the Department has seen a much larger number of schools take part across all school settings.

In addition to the summer programme grant, there are also grants for assistive technology, Irish sign language tuition and typing tuition for students who are visually impaired. There has been a significant increase in the number of teachers and SNAs allocated to schools in recent years. In special education alone, in excess of 40,000 dedicated professionals now work in this area. A review of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004 has been initiated to modernise and reflect the experiences of students, staff and families. Both commenced and uncommenced sections of the Act have been thoroughly considered to ensure a robust legislative foundation. The review process will culminate in a comprehensive report detailing all findings.

Ensuring every child's experience in school is positive and that they have qualified, engaged teachers available to support them in their learning is a key priority. Budget 2024 reflects the Government's commitment to ongoing investment in teacher supply. This includes the introduction of a professional masters of education incentive scheme for newly qualified teachers graduating in 2024. Eligible teachers will receive an incentive payment of up to €2,000, which will be paid in 2025. An expansion of upskilling programmes free of charge is also being made available to school staff. These are just some of the measures the Government and my Department have taken to invest in our primary schools.

The numbers employed in our schools will reach the highest ever level in the current school year. Currently, there are more than 42,900 teaching posts allocated across the primary school system, which represents an increase of more than 5,000 teachers when compared with the 2019-20 school year when I took up office. In three of the recent budgets, it has been acknowledged that I prioritised reducing the pupil-teacher ratio in primary schools by one point each year to a historic low of 23:1. Schools have also been given increased access to an administrative principal. The threshold by which a teaching principal becomes an administrative principal has been reduced from an enrolment of 176 pupils to 169 pupils. All schools with two special classes now have administrative principal status, regardless of their size. In budget 2024, the threshold for the appointment of an administrative deputy principal in special schools was removed. This means that 100 teaching deputy principals gained administrative deputy principalship. In budget 2024, I also provided for an additional 500 posts of responsibility at primary level for the 2024-25 school year; secured cost-of-living payments in successive budgets to support schools with rising costs; and simultaneously put in place structures to help schools to manage the most significant costs.

The final issue I wish to address is the issue of complex needs and the new special education teacher model. Heretofore, complex needs were addressed by local health teams. Schools and the Department relied on information which came from the local health teams. In some instances, it was forthcoming while in other instances it was less forthcoming. In some cases, it was non-existent. It was necessary to introduce a scheme in which complex needs are fully recognised. To do that, we rely on school data in the new model. In cases in which it is not available via school data, maximum weighting is given to the complex needs of a child.

It is absolutely untrue to say that complex needs are not recognised. They are given maximum weighting.

I thank Deputy Harkin for proposing this motion and giving us an opportunity to speak on it. It is quite a comprehensive motion calling on the Government to do nine things. I am going to zone in on one of them in my limited time, in respect of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004. I welcome that the Government is not proposing an amendment to the motion but in a sense I wish it was. I wonder if the Minister and I are in two different worlds. I pay tribute to the progress that has been made in reducing the pupil-teacher ratio and so on but honestly I am not sure where we go with this type of dialogue or monologue. While I welcome the progress that has been made, we are inundated with people coming into our offices in respect of that specific issue. They are looking for assessments, trying to get a SENO, trying to get an assessment, not to mention trying to get services. This was all to change. The Act was introduced in 2004 and it was to stop this kind of tomfoolery back and forth. It was bring in the idea of inclusiveness, to stop zoning in on disability and to provide for inclusive education for everyone.

It is 20 years since that Act was introduced. I will come back to the parts of it that we have not even enacted. There has been no review of it. The Minister did not refer to the review of that Act. The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission has a statutory mandate to keep under review the adequacy and effectiveness of our law and practice. It put in a report in respect of the review that is ongoing since 2021. We are now in 2024. The IHREC has carried out a review of over 80 pages. On page 15 it states: "we are concerned about the significant amount of time that has passed since the legislation was enacted and the announcement of a review; particularly as key parts of the Act have not been fully commenced." A very helpful footnote tells us that sections 3 to 13, 14(1)(b), 14(1)(d) to (f), 15 to 18, 38 and 39 have not been commenced. Page 15 of the EPSEN report also tells us that "The State’s normative practice of non-commencement of disability legislation or parts of disability legislation is concerning." It refers to a need for greater Oireachtas scrutiny. We are doing that by these motions as best we can in our limited time.

The IHREC report goes on and on in respect of the deficits that exist. It refers to the Acts and the parts that have not been implemented, which means people have to go under the 2005 Disability Act. It talks about inappropriateness of language and the misuse of language that is not fit in a modern world. It talks about updating that language and aligning our legislation with our national and international obligations. It talks about the obligation on us to sign the protocol which we have never signed. It refers to the absence of any legal remedies when people find themselves with no services. They have no place to go but to appeal to a TD. Page 46 of the report states that sections 3 to 13 of the 2004 Act provide a statutory entitlement to an education assessment. However, these provisions have never been commenced.

I could pick anything but I have one minute and 20 seconds left. I do not like this type of interaction. I wish we did not have to do this. It is not a reflection on Deputy Harkin, but I wish this motion was on the special educational needs Act that has never been reviewed. We should be discussing when the review will be completed, why it has not happened, and the consequences for children with disabilities and, equally importantly, for children without disabilities. The whole idea of the Act was that everybody would benefit from an inclusive education, in the best sense of the word. That has never happened. Perhaps in her closing speech, which I will be listening to in my office, the Minister will tell me whether the steering committee has met again in respect of that review, why it has taken so long and when the new Act will come into being. Will the Minister learn from the failures up to now and provide for a review in that Act? Like all TDs, I am going home to my constituency office on Friday and top of my list is doing another letter in desperation for somebody who has now managed to get the assessment of needs but there are no services. Equally I can think of somebody on an island who cannot get the services either. That normative, inclusive process has never become a reality.

I thank Deputy Harkin for bringing this Private Members' motion to the House today. I want to highlight the great work that has been done to campaign for adequate funding for primary education. The work by the primary school principal representatives is a great resource for all of us, as well as the constant work by the INTO in fighting for better funding and conditions for teachers and students. The motion reflects that work very well. There was a meeting in the audiovisual room last week. I am happy to support the motion.

I agree with Deputy Connolly. Listening to the Minister, there seems to be no problem in funding primary education. Are we living in two different worlds? Are the principals and the INTO making it up that there are issues? To me it is clear that there is a fundamental problem. We can drill down through every insufficient funding stream and grant. We can point to metrics for deciding funding like the principal release days which do not reflect reality. There is a clear overarching problem. We simply do not fund our primary education system enough to ensure an adequate learning or working environment for students or our primary school teachers and staff.

Work done by the primary school principals' representatives shows it has been 16 years since the banking collapse yet we still have primary school teachers and SEN teachers having to argue against austerity measures that have not been fully reversed. Our public services and many people's standard of living never really recovered from the austerity regime implemented by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, the Green Party and the Labour Party. That is reflected in the state of our primary school funding. We are last out of 36 developed countries on our per-student spending, at less than half of the OECD average. According to the INTO, we have the EU's largest class sizes. The 15% cut for special educational needs under the austerity regime has not been fully reversed. It is not hard to see where we are going wrong. The reality is that the Government is not funding our education system well enough for it to function properly.

A 2023 survey by the CPSMA found that seven out of ten primary schools have run at a deficit at some stage over the past 12 years and have had to rely on cash reserves to cover day-to-day costs due to insufficient core funding from the State. Schools reported that their heating costs have risen by an average of 37% over the course of the past two years. Electricity costs increased by an average of 35% and insurance costs by 19% on average during the same period. More than half of all the schools that responded said they had to raise funds to pay for basic utilities. A 2023 report commissioned by the CPSMA found that parental contributions were propping up the finances of the schools surveyed to the tune of €3.5 million, or an estimated €54 million nationally, money that was coming out of parents' pockets during the cost-of-living crisis. That is €54 million that should be provided by the State.

The starkest lack of funding is in special educational needs. The number of students with special educational needs increased by 56% between 2017 and 2021 yet austerity cuts still have not been fully reversed. SNA and SET allocations are frozen or cut and do not reflect demand. The 2024 allocation model was decided using data from 2016, despite current data being available. The primary principals are demanding to reinstate complex needs as a criterion to support early intervention, among other measures. I still have many parents coming to me who cannot get a school place for their child for next year. Services are dire. I sent this motion to a principal in my area who described the current funding model as the further marginalisation of our most vulnerable and a total dereliction of duty on the part of the Minister to provide even basic care for our children. I would have to agree with her.

I refer to the importance of school to children and young people, especially during a cost-of-living crisis. Schools provide a lifeline and respite for children living in deprivation and food or energy poverty. The Hunger in the Classroom study from last year found that 79% of teachers said they have hungry children in their classrooms every week. Some 40% said this happens every day and 73% said this problem is getting worse. I know there has been an intervention by the Minister in respect of school meals but it is not enough, according to this information.

The question now of children during the school holidays is an issue. During a cost-of-living crisis, with growing deprivation, people at risk of poverty and consistent poverty rates, the least the Government can do is provide a school environment which is properly resourced and funded. The fact that the Government continues to underfund our primary schools is a total dereliction of its duty to provide basic care for our children. I welcome that the Government is not opposing the motion but I am hoping that it will implement some of it.

Regardless of which sector or group comes into Leinster House, when they come back six years later to say that not only does the problem remain, it has actually got worse, any Minister worth their salt would sit up and pay attention to what these people are saying because that is exactly what happened last week. It does not need to be like this. This is the real irritation and the crux of the issue. The Government is quick to tell us that it is going to run a surplus of €8 billion. Clearly, what is missing here is the political will. Seven out of ten primary schools have run a deficit at some stage in the past 12 months. Schools report that the cost of heating has risen by more than 37%. Electricity costs have increased by 35% and insurance by 19%, on average, during the same period. These are the results from the Catholic Primary School Management Association, CPMSA, survey carried out in April. I give credit to the CPMSA for the work it does in trying to identify, isolate and label these gaps in funding in our schools. More than half of the respondents said their schools had to fundraise to pay for basic utilities. Almost three quarters of schools said they would not have enough money to pay their ancillary staff for the year. They also said they are unable to budget due to the lack of clarity about when and if some grants will be paid. I have raised the issue of the financial support services unit, FSSU, schedule before. When the OECD says that Ireland spends, on average, 12.5% less per student at primary level than other developed countries, the Minister's response is to question the method used by the OECD to establish that figure. This is simply not good enough. Principals, teachers and school staff tell me they are drowning as a result of the Government's failure to prioritise education. They tell me that they are trying their absolute hardest. I see this in the schools I go to, including my own children's school. How the staff keep the show on the road mystifies me at times, but they do. They go in every day and do their absolute damnedest for the kids in those classrooms. At the same time, I judge that against a principal who told me they actually did not know how they were going to pay a bill for getting rid of an infestation in the school. They did not have the money in the bank account. They did not know where it was going to come from. If the bill was not paid and the infestation not dealt with, the school would have to close. None of the children at that school deserved to be in that position. The question being asked time and again of the Government from across the country is when will there be proper funding and supports given to schools and teachers in order to ensure not only that schools can stay afloat but to put them in a position to enable the children who attend five days a week to thrive in an environment where they can succeed and reach their full potential. Without that, we know the knock-on effects that appear. We see them in our communities. Our children feel the effects in educational disadvantage and a loss of well-being. It is a vicious cycle. The independent analysis of primary and post-primary school funding has to be an absolute priority. There is no such thing as free education in this country. It is a myth and there is a considerable way to go until we get to that constitutional right for children to have the education they need. For that to happen, the Government needs to step up and ascertain where the gaps are in the funding and take meaningful and effective steps to address each and every one of them. Yes, there needs to be smaller class sizes and the capitation grant needs to increase in line with the cost of living. Ancillary, ICT and digitisation grants need to be fit for purpose. A grant schedule that is published and adhered to does not appear to me to be an ask of principals outside the realm of basic expectations.

For us to properly fund our education system, we need to have not only significant funding; we also need effective funding. That means identifying where the problems are. In the brief time I have left I will identify one of these problems, namely, the school book grant. Like most parents who have children finishing up this year, I now have in my possession two lists of items that will not be covered by the school book grant. The Government failed to fund it at a proper level last year and then took the decision to reduce the funding this year. These are not notiony items. These are calculators, A4 folders, pens, pencils and erasers. They are also very basic items that a child would need to be educated in a classroom these days. They also include educational resources such as Jolly Phonics, Oxford Reading Tree, Mathletics and Spellings for Me. None of these will be covered by the grant this year. The Government took a decision to reduce the grant to such an extent that principals were sending parents emails in the run-up to the local elections asking them to make it an election issue and to put it to the candidates from Government parties on the doorsteps that this needed to be reversed. Is it any wonder that Fianna Fáil lost more than 30 seats?

The long-term effects of inadequate funding in primary schools have led to a crisis which, if not properly addressed, will continue to have negative knock-on effects on our children's education and well-being. This is especially the case for children with additional needs, who also face many barriers to inclusivity, such as short school days, reduced timetables and permanent exclusion from school. The prevalence of autism is increasing. The Department of Education and the National Council for Special Education, NCSE, need to plan to ensure they meet the needs of students, going forward, which they are not currently doing. Sinn Féin is committed to making sure our education system is adequately funded and is inclusive and accessible for all children and all types of learners. Article 24 of the UNCRPD, which Ireland ratified in 2018, places obligations on the Government to ensure that people with disabilities are not excluded from education on the basis of disability and can access education on an equal basis with others. However, the present Government strategy seems to be only to react to crises. Currently, parents are applying to anything up to 20 schools for places for their child, and they may receive 20 refusals. That is soul-destroying for everybody involved. One parent who contacted me recently has a child in third class. The parent is already worrying - over three years out - about where she will find an appropriate school place for her child. She should not have to worry about that three months out. That planning should be in place. Another parent thought she was getting ahead of the posse by looking for a place 12 months out, only to find there was no place at all in her locality that would be able to facilitate her child.

Planning is needed rather than just reacting. Special educational needs, SEN, data should be gathered from schools via the primary online database, POD, to guarantee sufficient and appropriate school places for children with additional educational needs within their communities. There is still huge concern regarding the removal of complex needs as a criterion for set hours. The NCSE explained that this was done because information in respect of students was not forthcoming from the children's disability network teams, CDNTs, as they are not sufficiently staffed or working as they should be. Using the POD system would address this because teachers know their students and the students' needs. They would be able to input that information very easily to ensure that children's needs in the school are being met.

Special education teacher, SET, allocations were reprofiled during 2022 and came into effect in September 2022 for two years. According to the annual report from the NCSE, 362 schools applied for an exceptional review during that school year. Of those, 60 were put forward for review and only 39 were allocated an increase in SET hours. The red tape and bureaucracy around this process needs to be addressed, because it is off-putting. I think it is designed to be off-putting so that schools will not seek a review of their SET hours. That was certainly the case when I was teaching. We were almost afraid to look for a review in case we lost the small amount of resources we had. This needs to be addressed.

SET allocations and SEN provisions have been consistently under-supported for many years. Austerity measures introduced in 2011 reduced SEN resources by 15% and these cuts have never been fully reversed. In addition, the Government has failed to listen to the concerns of many teachers who have packed their bags and headed overseas. All our students, but particularly our SEN students, will be adversely affected by this. Funding education requires adequate investment.

The Minister referred to summer provision. While there has been a welcome increase in the number of schools participating in recent years, there are still too few schools participating to meet the needs of the students who most need summer provision. Those with the most complex needs are still being left out of the scheme. In many cases, home provision is not going to meet their needs. They need school-based provision.

I believe the capitation grant for summer provision has been cut. This makes no sense. It is good to increase the incentives for teachers and SNAs, but why is the capitation grant being cut? We need to see funding going in to ensure that the students with the most needs are getting the summer supports they need in order that they can slot back into school rather than being adversely affected over the summer.

I welcome this opportunity to address this with the Minister because I have been contacted by a number of schools across Laois-Offaly in recent weeks regarding the funding crisis and they have outlined to me the dire financial situation they are in. I have also met the Irish National Teachers Organisation and the Irish Primary Principals Network to listen to them and their concerns about the funding crisis. I have listened to them and the Government needs to listen to them.

While costs continuously go up, supports in real terms from the State go down. Seven out of ten primary schools have run a deficit at some stage in the past 12 months. Schools have reported that their heating costs have risen by an average of 37% over the past two years. Electricity costs have increased by 35% plus and insurance costs by nearly 20% during the same period. One-off cost-of-living grants to keep in line with the costs of electricity, etc., do not cut the mustard. I heard the Minister trotting out figures, but the one-offs do not address the funding crisis. They may get the Government a headline or a photo opportunity, but then the Government neglects to address the core problems and solutions in real terms. If schools are lucky, the capitation grant will cover electricity, heating and school insurance, all of which, as I said, are increasing. Local primary schools are very careful with money, very prudent, and the Minister, as a former teacher, knows that as well as I do. In many cases they do not have the money to cover such things as bins and sanitary disposal, office software, water charges, which were landed on them about 13 years ago, and a whole range of other costs.

The Government may brag about budget surpluses, but the OECD figures show that Ireland spends less on primary level than other developed countries. Schools are voluntarily fundraising. They ask for so-called voluntary contributions from parents, and the Minister knows what the voluntary contributions are. They are essential in a lot of cases to keep the school going. Golf classics, bring-and-buy sales and raffles are held to pay for basics. That is not acceptable to fund the basics of education in the primary sector. We could fund our education sector adequately if the Government were to choose to do so but it chooses not to fund it at primary level to the extent required. Funding for education needs serious, immediate and huge investment. The capitation grants need to be aligned with the current cost of living and costs across utilities. We in Sinn Féin have proposed that in our budgets over the past three or four years. The grant schedule needs to be published at the start of the year to give certainty throughout the year. The teacher supply crisis needs to be addressed meaningfully.

Last week, a number of teachers in the audiovisual room spelled out to us in great detail the situation with primary school funding. All of us across every constituency are very aware of this. We deal with schools up and down the country that are in dire circumstances, particularly in the area of special needs education. We have waiting lists there and families trying to find a classroom or a space. Usually, when they find that space in a school that is providing the service, the school is a long distance from them and they cannot get a place in a school close to them. Then, over many years, we find children being crisscrossed over and back across the country because their parents cannot find the service in their localities. Adequate funding and planning need to be put in place. One of the issues the teachers raised very strongly was that the POD system is not being used to identify at an early stage children who would need these additional services and that the Department is simply refusing to allow that to happen. What we have here is a crisis in a sector where there should not be a crisis and where we can see in advance where the problems will be and how they can be alleviated and sorted out.

One of the situations I am very conscious of - Deputy Clarke mentioned it earlier - relates to the school books grant, which was issued last year. It was not enough that time and now the Department has cut it back even further. It is ridiculous that children are getting this grant to get the schoolbooks but it does not meet the needs.

An issue several schools have raised with me is that we have families here from Ukraine and other countries who are in a school and are moved, not by their choice, to a different town or a different area. When they go from there and arrive in the next school, another school books grant has to be found for them and it does not exist because it has not been there at the beginning of the year. There are a whole range of issues where there is an absence of flexibility and, at the core of it all, an absence of adequate funding to ensure that we provide proper education facilities for all our children, whether they are children with special needs or children in mainstream classrooms. There needs to be recognition that this is not just a problem in isolation but a problem that is widespread across the country and requires adequate funding.

I thank the Independent Group for bringing this Private Members' business before us.

A clear message was sent to us in the audiovisual room last week by primary school principals from across the country, including Tipperary: urgent action is needed immediately. A lack of support staff to give teaching principals the time they need, the lack of consistent funding schedules to aid school budget planning, the inadequate resource allocation for SNAs and SETs - the list goes on, and the Minister is well aware of this. The principals made it clear that they need assurances now and cannot wait until the budget. The INTO recently outlined how this has affected the ability to recruit and retain staff, while the principals we listened to outlined how the dire conditions teaching principals work under highlight the current landscape of primary and special education. How are we in a situation in which the CPSMA survey carried out in April found that nearly three quarters of schools will not have enough money to pay their ancillary staff this year, with the average deficit between the grant and the moneys required being €7,100?

First, let us look at how the OECD figures show that Ireland spends on average 12.5% less per student at primary level than other developed countries. As regards special education, we were told that while the number of children with special needs increased by 56% between 2017 and 2021, the 2011 austerity measures, which reduced SEN resources by 15%, have not been fully reversed. The National Educational Psychological Service is under-resourced, while schools struggle to get additional SET or SNA support because of the nature of the appeals process.

Teachers and principals have been screaming all this and more, and the Minister needs to listen. The capitation grant needs to be aligned with current costs of living and in parity with other educational sectors. In addition, we need an independent analysis of school funding and a permanent increase in capitation that reflects the true cost of running schools. As I have said repeatedly, we need to accurately collect data to ascertain future need for special education, gather SEN data from schools through the primary online database, adjust it where needed and develop a roadmap in order that the SEN school profiles are met with the appropriate SEN allocations. Principals have spoken, and the Minister needs to pay heed now.

I thank Deputy Harkin and the Independent Group for bringing forward this motion. This is the crux of the matter every year, with school transport and everything else.

One of the main groups I met last week was the Irish Primary Principals Network. It set out a synopsis of the solutions. Its first request is to increase admin time for teaching principals, stating:

Burnout and Job Fatigue: Due to the dual responsibilities of teaching and administration, many Teaching Principals experience significant job stress and fatigue. The lack of adequate support staff exacerbates these issues, leading to high levels of burnout. High numbers stepping down from the role.

The second request is to increase primary school funding:

Align primary education funding (currently at 13% in Ireland) with the OECD average, increasing expenditure per student to at least 27% of per capita GDP. Establish a consistent funding schedule to aid in school budget planning.

Provide additional financial support on a permanent footing, to cover rising costs of utilities, insurance, and other operational expenses, reducing the need for schools to engage in extensive fundraising. Align primary capitation in parity with second level pupils. Ensure that smaller schools are not disadvantaged by per capita allocations.

The third request is an "Urgent Call to address Chronic Under Resourcing of Special Education Needs ... Supports and Provisions":

Increasing Demand:

The number of children with special needs in primary schools increased by 56% between 2017 and 2021.

Families face significant challenges in finding the appropriate placements.

Inadequate Resource Allocation:

Special Needs Assistants ... and Special Education Teacher ... allocations have been frozen or cut. Allocations do not match the level of need presenting in our schools.

The 2011 austerity measures reduced SEN resources by 15%, and these cuts have not been fully reversed.

Chronic Teacher supply crisis at present in Primary Education — SEN pupils most adversely affected.

It mentioned the flawed allocation model. The 2024 allocation model uses outdated data from 2016 which ignores the current needs. The model relies on enrolment numbers, literacy and numeracy scores and educational disadvantage metrics but lacks the individual profiling. Current and accurate data can easily be gathered from the schools via the primary online database or annual census returns.

The recommendations were to increase the funding to reverse the austerity cuts, enhance the professional support for testing and diagnosis, simplify and improve the appeals process for additional resources, develop a strategic plan to improve SEN provision over the next three years and address the chronic teacher-supply shortage that is plaguing the system with an action plan.

I thank Deputy Harkin and the Independent Group for bringing forward this motion. I have a speech prepared but I received an email from a principal in a school in my constituency at 10.05 a.m. which I would like to put on record because it relates to funding challenges for the provision of autism classes, which is within the broader scope of this motion.

There is a school in my constituency which is one of the leaders in providing special classes for children with autism. In 2021 the school was granted €590,000 for an additional autism class and ancillary accommodation. The class was opened in September 2021 in the school library as a temporary measure, given the demand that existed for places. The school appointed an architect to commence works on planning for the extension and prepared the necessary reports and kept in touch with the Department all along the way. Planning permission was granted in March 2023 but, as the school chased up the Department, seeking a final email of confirmation in respect of the funding, it was advised that the grant aid had been reduced by €200,000, to €380,000, with no explanation as to why. The school is extremely frustrated and feels defeated. It has housed six autistic children for three years in an upstairs library as an interim measure on the understanding that a new multisensory classroom, a para-education room, would soon be ready for these children. Obviously, their being temporarily housed in the library has a knock-on impact for other pupils and learning in the school.

Unfortunately, following yesterday’s email from the Department of Education, the project is untenable and the school faces having to close the class which has been open for the past three years. This is a school that has done much of the heavy lifting in autism class provision in my constituency. From speaking to other TDs and representatives across the country, I know there are some schools that have three or four classes, while other schools have none. That cannot continue. We need to ensure there is provision in all schools for special education, regardless of the school size or patron body. Parents of autistic children or children with additional needs do not have the same choices as other parents if they are lucky enough to live in an area that has a number of different school options with different patron bodies. For the parents of an autistic child, that choice is automatically reduced because they are unable to choose between their child going to the Catholic, Protestant, Educate Together or community national school or the Gaelscoil. Instead they must choose whichever school has the autism classes and that is not within the spirit of diversity of choice and of patronage. I will give the Minister a little pack on this and I ask that she look at it and request her senior officials to look at this case and ensure that the initial funding that was promised by her Department, for which the school - which is delivering a service and education for children who need it - had planned, is delivered in order that its education provision can continue.

The substance of the motion is wonderful. It is has come from what we heard in the audiovisual room last week. The pupil-teacher ratio remains far too high. With Deputy Ó Ríordáin, our education spokesperson, all the Labour Party's alternative budgets in the lifetime of this Government have included a costed reduction in the pupil-teacher ratio. In our alternative budget for 2024 that would have been a two-point reduction, which would have brought it down to 20.8 from the 22.8 now. That would still be 0.8 over the EU average but it would bring us closer. Obviously, we do not want to meet the average. Ultimately we want to be best in class on the pupil-teacher ratio but we are still miles away from that.

The capitation grant of €1 per pupil per school per day to cover the running costs at primary level, and almost double that at secondary level, needs to be re-examined. As the parent of a child who is just finishing their first year in junior infants, I am benefiting from the free books scheme and the hot school meals programme which is funded from the Department of Social Protection. These are great schemes that help parents. I am passionate about the school meals scheme. I think it is a wonderful scheme and want to see it evolve, and I am sure it will, to ensure that every child gets it in every school. No matter which school, one does not know the circumstances of the children arriving at the school gate in the morning and whether they are coming from a direct provision centre or homeless accommodation. They may be coming from a household that is poor or there may be illness or disability and they may not be able to get a hot meal at home. For that hot meal to be provided in a uniform, egalitarian manner in the school classroom is a wonderful thing. While the scheme needs to be improved, the basis is good and it should be supported. Children get excited to know they are sharing the same experience as their classmates. It cuts through any socioeconomic gap or privilege and ensures that every kid has the same experience, albeit with different options. It helps kids who might be fussy eaters to be inspired by children who are getting different things every day. There are many benefits to it. However, if a school is unable to afford heating, basic maintenance work or a caretaker to empty the bins every day, then things like the hot school meals programme and the free schoolbooks seem like added extras when they should be the basics. Those other basics of light, heat, cleanliness and hygiene need to be delivered but they are not being delivered. We need to do away with the pressure that is being put on parents to fill that funding gap and do away with the pressure on principals, in particular, but also on all other staff - teaching and ancillary staff – to work extra hard to meet the basic costs it takes to run a school. That is the job of the State and the Department. That is what this motion calls for and we support it fully.

I thank the Independent Group for this timely motion. It is an important motion for discussion as schools start to wind down at the end of the year and have an opportunity to rest and to start looking at what they had to do just to keep the lights on during the past year.

Primary schools nationwide face a funding crisis. They face crises on multiple fronts but funding is to the fore. This has been the case for some time. Those most vulnerable in our education system, those who have special educational needs, are suffering most as a result. Every child is suffering, however. Primary school principals are operating on the edge of breaking point but they hesitate to speak out on chronic underfunding and its results due to a fear that enrolment numbers might fall, which would perpetuate the problems these schools face.

The Minister will know that seven out of ten primary schools have run a deficit in the past 12 months. This indicates a systemic malaise affecting the sector. Many of those schools' energy costs have risen by an average of 37% for heat and 35% for electricity over just two years. They have been further hamstrung by insurance costs, which rose by close to one fifth in the same period. This has led to more than half of primary schools being forced to fundraise just to heat their classrooms, turn their lights on and insure their hallways. This state of affairs is beyond unacceptable and is something that has repeatedly been made apparent to the Minister. We would deem it a crisis if these were the only issues facing by primary schools but the reality is that there are far more.

For example, almost 75% of schools cannot pay for ancillary staff this year, with an average gap between grants paid and costs of more than €7,000.

How can schools that are already understaffed and underfunded come up with these sums, which are required to just about steady the ship? Schools are not even able to budget or plan due to a lack of clarity as to whether or when some grants will be paid, which one organisation, the Catholic Primary Schools Management Association, has shown with its latest survey is causing school principals to leave their posts because they are overworked, burned out and seemingly abandoned by the State. Despite the Department's claim the additional funding provided by the Government's budget has helped cover running costs, this is little more than a yarn spun to obscure the dire reality primary schools are facing. It is an awful accusation to say that the Department's claim is a yarn and I do not make it lightly, but when we talk to school leaders, principals and teachers, they tell us the money coming in simply does not cover the costs, so it is clearly the reality in our schools throughout the country.

If a school is one of the lucky ones, capitation grants will cover their heating, electricity and insurance costs, but even they will fall short of covering other day-to-day expenses as a result of Ireland spending, on average, 12.5% less per student at primary school level than do other developed countries, according to OECD figures. Those day-to-day expenses that are not provided for include office software, waste disposal, water charges, bank charges, photocopying, plumbing and boiler servicing, security, lifts and disability infrastructure, payroll and administration, accountancy, fire regulation, stationery and teachers' resources.

I spoke to one principal in my constituency last week. He said that at the start of the new school term, he would usually bring in a cleaning company to undertake a deep clean of the school, including the carpets, in order that when the students and their parents came in on their first day, they would get that nice fresh smell, but he said the possibility of that is simply gone. It seems like a bygone era when a school would have been able to have that luxury. Imagine being a principal who, if lucky, has only to think about finding the funds for everything I mentioned, with many unable to even consider these necessities because they face the possibility of their classrooms going without heating or lighting or of their schools going uninsured.

I want to talk about the idea of a school going without heating. Each year, and recently in particular, we hear about the extent of child poverty in this State. Child poverty is measured by a number of factors, one of which is a child's inability to access a warm coat or a second pair of shoes. If there is a combination of a child being unable to afford a warm coat and a school unable to afford to heat its rooms, that is a dystopian, borderline Dickensian reality happening our schools and we should be ashamed of ourselves because of it.

How did we get to this point? It is no wonder teachers leave our shores in droves, unwilling to work in such dire conditions. The ancillary service grant, sadly, falls at the same hurdle. The grant used to cover secretaries, cleaners and caretakers but the Department has watered down its effectiveness to provide for their costs, with secretaries' salaries and employers' PRSI deducted from the ancillary grant, completing defeating the grant's purpose, which was to cover the cost of these roles. It is awful to hear that some schools have found themselves unable to pay caretakers and cleaners for an academic year, leading to job losses never before anticipated, in jobs that are still direly needed. This causes countless health and safety issues for students and staff. Many principals have ended up working long, back-breaking hours to fulfil these roles because the Department is not willing to provide for them. This is not sustainable. Primary school principals cannot be expected to fix plumbing at 8 p.m.

Schools are not known to run surpluses, yet when progressive grants were provided by the Department in the past, such as the cost-of-living grant in budget 2024 and Covid supports, they were discontinued, plunging schools back into a deficit. The ICT grant has been horrifically managed, with many schools left without their grants to pay for an order put in before the announcement of its discontinuation. The primary school free books scheme, which was introduced to much fanfare, was reduced from €96 per pupil to €80 for the coming academic year, yet schools had to absorb the shortfall last year, which will be worse again in September. This is not sustainable. School books cost up to €27 per book, plus workbooks, so schools are forced to ask parents for contributions, despite the Department having told them not to. It is a comedy of errors and a failure in duty of care.

It does not stop there, however. Summer programme grants have been cut, rendering many programmes unfeasible, and the DEIS grant ends up providing for the day-to-day expenses the capitation grant should cover, instead of providing for the additional resources it is intended to cover. The school meals programme represents another failure of provision by the Department and in many schools, it is teachers and principals who heat the food, hand it out and clean up. Hot school meals are welcome, but the fact another task is being imposed on principals, who were overburdened before this, makes a mockery of the scheme.

The financial support services unit has advised schools not to ask parents for more money but they are allowed to ask parents for voluntary contributions, which they should not be asked for. Voluntary contributions are one of the horrors of the English language. There is absolutely nothing voluntary about a child going home with a note in their backpack to give to their parents to ask for money to cover what should be a basic provision of the State.

Primary school communities deserve to know now whether they will be adequately provided for in the next budget to keep on the heating and lighting, cover their basic running costs and allow their principals, teachers and other staff to do their jobs and not somebody else's. It is no wonder we are facing a staffing crisis when the Department has repeatedly shown such disregard to our school leaders.

Our schools are in dire straits, and I do not mean that in any way as an affront to our school leaders, teachers, SNAs or anybody else. Our schools are in an horrendous, dystopian state because they ae underfunded and antiquated and because we very clearly have no ambition for schools in this country. Otherwise, they would not be rendered in the state in which they are. We really need to do better.

I am going to share time. I welcome the motion and note that the Government has not tabled an amendment to it, which means it is going to allow the motion to pass with no intention of implementing its demands for dramatic reductions in pupil-teacher ratios, investment according to OECD averages and so on. It makes something of a farce of this place, to be honest. Our primary schools have been run on a shoestring for decades. It is simply not possible to run a school on the stingy capitation and ancillary grants that are doled out by the Department of Education, and the Government knows this but it intends to continue along those lines. The Government knows that school principals are having to endlessly badger parents to fundraise to keep schools running. It knows underfunding schools forces them to operate as mini-NGOs, dependent on charity. It knows this places schools in working-class areas and children with additional needs at particular disadvantage but it does not seem to care.

I was in touch with several principals in my area to ask what this looks like on the ground and I got a series of horror stories back from people. One principal, of Rathcoole Educate Together National School, said the school has to ask parents every year for voluntary contributions just to stay open. They said electricity and heating costs are skyrocketing, with no additional funds to help. They said that those in the school’s parents' group are killing themselves fundraising in order that they can buy sensory toys and yard equipment, and that while a sensory room is needed in the mainstream school, these are not standard, so the school has to fundraise for it, at more than €10,000. The principal went on to say that because the school has been in temporary accommodation, with no hall, for four years, it looked at renting a hall for PE, especially in winter, but there are no funds to cover it. They said a full SET position in the school has been empty for most of the year due to the teacher crisis and insisted the Department is doing absolutely nothing about. They said the school needs to find staff and additional assistant principal posts and pay them properly, given no one wants an "assistant principal 2" role because the pay is ridiculously low. They said the school is being paid for eight teachers but not for the 11 SNAs, the cleaner or the secretary. They said they have a team of 21, not eight, and that this does not even include the bus escorts. I could go on with what that principal said.

Another principal said that this year, the school had only a part-time SET teacher, when it was entitled to a full position, because it could not find someone for the position. They said they had often been left without substitute cover either, due to a shortage of substitutes. They said the school's secretary had recently switched to being paid by the Department and that the remaining money it had sent in the school's ancillary grant was €400, which was to cover maintenance costs for two thirds of the school year. That is not enough to pay a caretaker for one month, never mind two thirds of the year. The principal said the school has to rely on the goodwill of staff and parents for basic needs such as cutting the grass and maintaining the school property. It is extremely stressful on the principal and is an unfair ask of staff and students, forced to go above and beyond.

Elsewhere in my constituency, Riverview Educate Together National School and Setanta Special School have been forced to share space since 2020 because the Department has failed to provide the new school buildings that were promised. Parents in Riverview tell me that children are being taught and cared for in toilets, offices and corridors. This is particularly impacting children requiring movement and sensory breaks who are relegated to hallways and toilets. Incredibly, one child sees an art therapist weekly in a cupboard. This is happening in 2024. For many years, students have had no access to a school hall for indoor PE because the hall is being used as a classroom.

The frustrating thing about all of these horrific stories is that they are unnecessary. The Government has a €65 billion surplus. It could fund everything that schools needed tomorrow and resolve the housing crisis, which is a major driver of teacher shortages.

A number of years ago, we passed a referendum to put children first, but when one listens to the testimonies of the school principals who were in Leinster House last week or of the parents, teachers and SNAs who attended our recent meetings on special education, what they describe is a dire crisis in our schools and the Government's complete failure to adequately resource, staff and fund schools for our children, thereby shortchanging our children on their future and potential.

The disconnect between the Minister’s narrative and the testimonies we are hearing from teachers, school principals, SNAs and parents is stunning and probably tells us why she is not tabling an alternative motion. She does not even believe her own narrative. According to it, there is no underfunding crisis. It has to do with the way we calculate GDP, apparently. We have loads of extra staff and adequate funding and we are making strides forward. She does not table a countermotion, though, so she does not really believe all of that. She knows that the accounts we are getting from teachers, principals, parents and so on are the truth. They describe teachers, principals and SNAs who are burned out and considering leaving the job. We have schools that are overwhelmed by the cost of heating, energy price hikes, insurance costs, day-to-day running and managing deficits, with special needs children in particular being let down in terms of the resources and teachers they need. Under the new allocation model, one third of schools lost special education teaching resources. The Minister claims that resources for complex needs have not been removed, but that is what has happened. Teachers and principals have told us to trust schools and listen to them. They know what they need and they have the information we need, but the Government does not want to know what they need because it is not willing to give them the necessary resources. There is an inability to recruit and retain teachers because they are running away from working under these conditions and that level of stress.

I wish to paint a picture of the provision of school buildings in my area. The lack of planning and commitment to schools has been extraordinary. Gaelscoil Laighean has been in two temporary buildings and is now in its third. It has a permanent site, but there is still no planning permission for the building. Dún Laoghaire Educate Together National School has been on several temporary sites. It now has a permanent site with planning permission, but there is no sign of construction commencing. Sallynoggin Educate Together National School is in a temporary building and has no permanent site yet. It has one ASD class and has asked the Department for another because it is massively oversubscribed, but the Department has said it will not get one until it gets a permanent building and will not even say when it will get that building. Gaelscoil Phádraig has been waiting 20 years for a permanent building. Blackrock Educate Together Secondary School is moving into its secondary temporary building and still does not know when a permanent site will be tendered for. There is simply no political commitment or will on the part of the Government to fund, resource and plan for the education of our children. It is a disgrace. We have the resources. There is just a lack of political will.

I welcome the sixth class boys and girls and their teachers from my national school in Belclare in Galway. They are welcome to this great House. I thank Belle Keating for organising the trip with me. It is appropriate that national schools are present when we are discussing funding primary schools. I thank Deputy Harkin and her team for tabling this motion.

The Minister of State appeared before the Joint Committee on Disability Matters yesterday. I spoke to the principal of Belclare National School before entering the Chamber. The school is supplying July provision, but the capitation per pupil has been cut by 25%. The money has gone to pay the teachers, but the scheme is not working right in terms of providing the children the school services they need. For €15 a head, the Minister of State might reconsider the matter. It is not a large amount of money at all.

On the question of how we fund primary schools, their running costs have increased somewhat, particularly in terms of heating, lighting and meeting all the new regulations that go with those. The Government accepts this, as it has been making one-off payments to schools, but we need to recognise that primary schools are being left behind, as their capitation grant has not been increased for the past 13 years. They are €145 per student behind secondary schools. A primary school has to do everything that is needed to ensure it is run to the highest standards and that everything is right in the school, but many schools that had reserves built up to pay for the niceties they would have liked to get are now using those reserves to pay for ordinary maintenance, insurance, heating, lighting, ventilation, etc.

It is important to say that the job of a school principal has changed considerably over the years. The management of a school and the paperwork and regulations that go with it have created significant challenges for principals. The reinstatement of the assistant school principal role should be done urgently. It was cut during the time of austerity. From what we hear, austerity is well gone now and we have billions of euro in surplus every year thanks to the taxes we raise. It is important that we immediately consider the reinstatement of the assistant principal position in national schools. Much of the work that a principal does has nothing to do with teaching, but with the management of everything else. I look at how Belclare National School has developed since I was there. I will not say when. It has developed since it was built as a four-classroom school in 1956. It now provides education for more than 300 students per annum. There are 50 students present today who will be going into secondary school, so it is doing the job right, as is every other primary school in the area and across the country. According to an OECD report, we are spending 10% less on the provision of primary education than other developed nations. Such education is fundamental and we as a national pride ourselves on providing the best education to everyone. It is an asset for this country. When foreign direct investors are looking at places to locate, we see the benefit of it. Let us not just rest on our laurels and say that the schools will take care of themselves. It is important that we meet demand by providing additional funding.

In terms of capital expenditure, I would like to discuss issues affecting a number of schools in my area, including the amalgamation of the three primary schools in Tuam to form the Trinity Primary School. It formed approximately three years ago with the expectation that a new building would be delivered as quickly as possible.

They are still at design development stage. The process by which these projects are brought to fruition is long-winded. The system has been set up to slow down the pace of spending money rather than speeding it up. The same applies to the Gaelscoil campus in Athenry, where both the national and secondary school are in dire need of a new school, as is the amalgamated boys' and girls' school in Athenry.

A number of other schools are painfully going through the process of building out their campuses. However, it takes a decade to get a school built once a plan is incepted. That is way too long and there is no need for it but a process has been put in place with all kinds of approvals, from appointing a design team to approving tender analysis, approving planning permission and so on. It has become a circus of approvals with much more money now spent on consultants and reports than is necessary. The idea of approval processes was to make sure we got value for money, but we have brought the processes to a stage where we do not get value for money. As well as that, we are delaying the process of construction. In light of the current level of construction inflation, if you pause, it will cost you. When you plan something and do not build it for six or seven years, you can be sure the price will have doubled or increased even more.

Coming from a construction background, I get frustrated that much of this paperwork was created to slow things down. We have built an industry out of it. It is something we have to look at for the school building programme and across all public construction. We are grinding it to the extent that we are not building what we should be and are spending a great deal of the money we have set out for the projects on consultants' reports and paperwork and all kinds of approvals that are not necessary. We employ people in local authorities to produce the reports and employ people in the Department of Education to do the same thing when we should be taking a commonsense approach.

As one Deputy said, we should trust that whatever schools are doing - they are doing it right - and work with schools to deliver the infrastructure they require. National schools are our pride and joy in this country and rural national schools are a beacon of light in rural Ireland. We need to ensure that primary schools are funded to the level they need in order that they can maintain standards.

Ba mhaith liom comhghairdeas a ghabháil leis an Teachta McNamara. I congratulate Deputy McNamara, who is in the Chamber. It is great to see him here in the aftermath of his being elected as an MEP. I look forward to engaging with him in that role.

We fully endorse the motion. It is evident there is chronic underspending by Government on primary schools. I thank Nóirín Ní Mhaoldomhnaigh and the other principals who came up last week with their teams to put it bluntly to us how bad the situation is. I commend the Independent Group on tabling the motion.

Ireland's expenditure is equivalent of 13% of GDP, while the OECD average is 27% - more than double. That says enough. The Minister of State should listen to the people. This leaves Ireland last of 36 developed countries for spending on education, as per the OECD report. A survey conducted by the Catholic Primary School Management Association in April and May 2024 revealed schools have experienced a staggering increase of 35% in energy costs over the past two years. Insurance costs surged by 98% in the same period. There is everything else as well. We know it from our own households. Primary schools have been operating on a shoestring. I served on the board of management of our national school. Alarmingly, seven out of every ten primary schools have found themselves operating at a deficit in the last two years. That is shocking. When will the Government listen to them and understand?

We had Covid and all the rigmarole brought in at the time. We have health and safety and all those issues that must be complied with now but that were not there previously. Some are necessary and some are over the top. We were told insurance costs would come down but in fact they have gone up. There is a situation with not having assistant principals. What will happen is we will not have principals in national schools. They cannot cope with the stress, trauma and sleepless nights, wondering where the next shilling will come from.

The chronic underfunding of education is a pressing issue that requires immediate attention. The future of our children and nation depend on it. The Government must take decisive action to ensure that all students, regardless of background or needs, have access to a quality education. The capitation grant barely covers energy and electricity costs, with little or no funding left to cover all the other costs involved in running a school. There is the impact of the reduction of the primary school free books scheme, the disappearance of the ICT grant scheme, the cut of €15 per pupil in the summer programme grant and the reduction in the ancillary service grant.

Schools need to fundraise to pay bills. Fundraising is more difficult in areas of deprivation and in small rural schools. In some cases, local parish priests are paying the electricity or fuel bills of schools.

The number of children with special needs and their families still desperately seeking school places for September 2024 is alarming. There are over 45,000 children registered with children's disability network teams across the country. The crisis in recruitment and retention of teachers across our education system has a greater adverse effect on special education needs.

There is a serious issue in my constituency with school bus services. Currently, 33 students in Bantry cannot get to Schull Community College. Another group in Ardfield near Clonakilty cannot reach Rosscarbery for school due to limited transport options. This not only contradicts the green agenda by forcing parents to drive 50 km daily, but also raises questions about Government's accountability.

It is crucial for the Minister for Education to address this issue promptly, beyond issuing generic responses. This is not just about convenience; it is also about environmental responsibility. Above all, the idea of parents worrying at this time of the year about how their children will get to school or if they will get to school at all by means of school transport is astonishing. The Minister made a promise here last year the issue would be resolved. It is in the programme for Government that the close school rule and every issue in relation to education will be resolved but for the people of Bantry who want to go to Schull and those in Ardfield who want to go to Rosscarbery, it is not resolved.

Sorry, Deputy McNamara. There are two elevations. The findings of the survey conducted by the Catholic Primary School Management Association highlighted a concerning reality. The fact that seven out of ten primary schools have run at a deficit at some point over the past twelve months indicates a significant financial strain on our education system. This strain is due to insufficient core funding from the State, forcing schools to rely on cash reserves to cover day-to-day costs.

We have seen schools out every day shaking the bucket to try to pay basic bills. This happens throughout County Kerry. I am dealing with boards of management, principals, teachers and indeed parents who are put under pressure by the fact the State is not providing the necessary funding to run our schools properly. It is like a slippery slope. This was happening before Covid. It has been going on for a long time that schools are being left to their own devices. The education of our young people is such an important issue. Our teachers, principals and boards of management have enough to be doing and should not be out shaking buckets in an attempt to raise money to pay for essentials for their schools.

I thank the Independent Group for bringing this important motion before us. We need action from the Government on this issue.

I thank the teachers, SNAs, cleaners, communities, caretakers, parents and schoolchildren who go above and beyond to make sure their schools stay open. The work they do outside of what is funded by Government goes above and beyond. Look at what smaller schools have to do. They do not get the same funding as schools with more than 100 students. There are criteria whereby smaller schools - which are the rural schools - do not get the same type of funding.

They get only a certain number of secretarial staff. I thank the secretaries of the schools as well who go above and beyond to do the work within the schools.

I thank the people who come together to put in place after-school places for children, and preschools, for what they do to make sure they are feeder schools and they allow people to work and to have the infrastructure in their areas. When it comes to funding these preschools, the Department provides matched funding. In Bruff, County Limerick, for instance, where they are trying to build a preschool and after-school service, every time they go to the contractor the cost is going up week-on-week because of inflation. The Government needs to step in here and make sure there is a fund put in place so that where inflation is rising by 10% or 15% on building contracts, they cover the full amount of that to make sure these preschools and after-schools are fully funded because the rest of it comes back to the communities to raise to make sure our schools survive.

As I say, the people in the schools and in the parishes we represent go above and beyond and no money would pay them for what they do to make sure the education of the children going forward is protected.

I thank the Independent Group for bringing forward this timely and important motion.

We all received the briefing last week and it was one of the most intense briefings that I have attended to date. It was incredibly interesting to note that the role of principals has not been reviewed since 1974. We heard from a principal who is a special needs teacher four days of the week and principal for one day. That is not practical. The principal outlined that he is also a plumber when a pipe bursts. He described so many other roles that he undertakes because he is the principal of the school and the buck stops with him. He spoke about playing catch-up with emails until 1 a.m. On the day, he said that out of the seven principals who started together, he is the only one still standing in his position as the other six have left due to burnout and strain from the stress that they deal with in trying to keep the school going. He asked who would want to be on a ship with no one steering it.

They outlined that a number of grants and supports have been removed or cut. The cost-of-living grant, the enhanced cleaning and PPE grants and the ICT grant are gone. The latter disappeared once the free book scheme was announced. The summer programme has been cut by €15 per pupil per week. There has also been no audit completed after Covid - they pointed to a bit of a gap. All the while, they have had increases in school insurance costs and running costs. It is all pressure and that pressure gets passed on. I suppose the parents are feeling it too in terms of fund-raising and trying to do their bit to help the school.

They struggle immensely with not receiving their budget at the start of the school year. That is something I hope the Minister can look into as this is a practical step that the Department can take to ensure the school year starts on the right footing.

On the SET allocations, can the Minister and her officials trust the principals? That is what they have requested. They already do when it comes to such high levels of responsibility, so why not when it comes to providing the data on needs? We heard of a child with no hands having no supports in place come September. Instead, they will not come forward until the child is in the chair.

On behalf of the Government, I welcome the opportunity to close what has been an insightful and informative discussion about this important matter.

The many issues raised and statements made today will feed into the Department's ongoing commitment to the provision of funding and other supports to the primary school system. As the Minister, Deputy Foley, said, the Government is aware that costs and funding can pose a real problem for schools. I repeat that the Government and the Department of Education, in particular, are constantly working to address this matter and to enhance the financial and other supports available to schools. As the Minister also said, measures are being constantly reviewed and revised. I will speak in some more detail now about some of those.

This month sees the issuing of the second tranche of primary school capitation funding for the 2023-24 school year. This represents a full restoration of capitation to pre-2011 levels. While I do not wish to pre-empt the outcome of any future budget negotiations or fiscal parameters agreed by the Government, the Department of Education will continue to seek to prioritise the funding required to meet the ongoing costs of running schools.

Ancillary funding has been mentioned in a similar context. I emphasise that those schools that have seen their ancillary grants reduced are in no way disadvantaged by the reduction as the amount that their grant is now reduced by equals the amount they previously paid to secretaries. That cost is now funded directly by the Department through its payroll and there is no net difference for schools.

Correspondence issued to all schools on 20 December 2023 provided details of these arrangements for the period from September to December 2023. Further correspondence issued on 26 April 2024 setting out the position for the period from January to August 2024. Schools have been advised that work and engagement is ongoing to identify a method of standardising the reduction to the ancillary and school services support fund, SSSF, grants for the longer term where school secretaries are being paid via a payroll operated by the Department. Engagement will take place with school management bodies in order to discuss these arrangements to ensure they are as reasonable and as fair as possible for all schools. Further details of these arrangements will be provided to schools as soon as they become available.

Further to the free schoolbooks initiative, as this scheme is now implemented in every recognised primary and special school, it is expected that schools have used the funding provided in the 2023-24 school year to purchase stocks of schoolbooks and other classroom resources. Many of these items are now available to schools for reuse in the 2024-25 school year and in future school years. The funding allocated to the scheme in the 2024-25 school year takes account of this.

In budget 2024, over €47 million was allocated to continue implementation of the school books scheme at primary level. The payment per pupil for the 2024-25 school year is €80. Payments totalling €44.7 million were made to schools under the scheme in May 2024. It is expected that over 563,000 children and young people in 3,230 primary and special schools will benefit from this scheme in the 2024-25 school year.

Special schools that have students enrolled in junior cycle programmes have received funding at the junior cycle per capita rate of €309 per student as set out under the new junior cycle schoolbooks scheme. A total of 3,230 primary and special schools will receive the administration support grant from this week, the week commencing 24 June, at a total cost of €2.2 million.

The digital strategy for schools, along with other initiatives, is constantly under review. As part of the review of the national development plan, the Department's aim is to provide better clarity and certainty for schools on the timelines for payment of minor works and ICT grant funding. The Department will also continue to provide broadband connectivity to all schools through the schools broadband programme at an annual cost of some €13 million.

On the subject of special education, as well as the significant increases mentioned in the number of teachers and SNAs allocated to schools over the past number of years, there has been an increase in the number of schools that have registered to run a summer programme in 2024. More than 1,700 individual expressions of interest have been received from schools seeking to run this year's summer programme. In 2023, over 1,400 schools participated in the summer programme. All of the measures for the 2024 summer programme, including the non-pay grant, have been designed to maximise the number of schools and children taking part in the school-based programme.

I will talk a little about the new special education teacher and SNA allocation model. There have been significant increases in the number of teachers and SNAs allocated to schools over the past number of years. There has been no freezing of allocations and schools that require additional resources receive them, as the recent SET reviews demonstrate.

The Department commenced a review of the SET model in late 2022 to ensure it is meeting the changing needs of children in special education. In the 2023-24 school year, over 60% of exceptional reviews for SET teachers resulted in additional resources being provided. In the same school year, over 68% of SNA reviews were successful.

I also emphasise that complex needs as a criterion has not, in fact, been removed. However, the data which was used since 2017 from the CDNTs, and which is no longer routinely available, is being replaced by high-quality verifiable education data. The complex needs of children are now supported through the educational teacher needs profile of each school. The Department is very much aware that additional data is available in individual schools and a key focus of the roadmap for SET allocations is to develop an accurate and verifiable system to capture such data.

The use of the primary online database will be investigated as a vehicle for such data.

The Department has already committed, in consultation with education partners, to examine an ongoing continuous improvement process that can give schools more input into identifying the need in their school in the most efficient way possible. Almost 1,300 new special classes have been sanctioned over the past four years. For the coming school year, 3,000 special classes will operate in primary and post-primary schools. Seven new special schools have been established in recent years and another four special schools will open in counties Meath, Kildare, Wexford and Limerick for the coming school year. Capacity is also being expanded in a number of existing special schools. Budget 2024 provided funding for up to 400 new special classes and 300 additional special school places. As part of the review of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004, mentioned by the Minister, an open day will be held in September to gather final feedback from all stakeholders. This review will serve as the foundation for the updating of the Act to ensure a solid legislative basis.

Schools receive a range of supports to assist them to support children who are beneficiaries of temporary protection or are in the international protection scheme. Schools are provided with extra English as an additional language teacher allocations. They are also allocated additional temporary special educational supports and a range of supports and well-being resources from NEPS. The motion also references resources for refugee and asylum-seeking children for which schools receive a range of supports. Schools are provided with extra English as an additional language teacher allocations and are also allocated additional temporary special educational supports, and a range of supports and well-being resources from NEPS.

In the area of teacher supply, as well as the budget 2024 measures reflecting the Government's commitment to ongoing investment, further initiatives to address teacher supply changes include 610 additional places on initial teacher education programmes for primary level over the academic years 2023-24 and 2024-25; ensuring flexibility in initial teacher education programmes to allow student teachers to support schools; the 3,700 student teachers currently registered under the Teaching Council's route 5, which is the highest number ever; and encouraging retired teachers to provide substitute cover resulting in a significant increase of 49% in teaching days provided between the 2021-22 and 2022-23 school years. A new communications campaign began earlier this year to encourage retired teachers to return to teaching. The Teaching Transforms campaign continues to promote the teaching profession and encourage students to follow a career in teaching. The campaign uses digital, radio and video media and is supported by a dedicated webpage. The measures in the primary sector have contributed to the lowest ever teacher allocation ratio in primary schools with a 10% reduction in the average student per teacher ratio between 2017 and 2023. The new pay deal will mean that teachers' starting salary will increase to €46,000 rising to a maximum of €85,000 per year, which compares well internationally. Starting pay of €46,000 will be almost €20,000 higher than the 2011 rates. The Department of Education continues to engage closely with education stakeholders to develop further innovative measures to address teacher supply issues.

The motion calls on the Government to commit to making schools VAT-exempt bodies or allow them to claim VAT concessions or refunds. The situation is that schools pay VAT but, as with all charities, they are not allowed to claim funds off VAT. There is a VAT compensation scheme for charities that it is possible to avail of.

As the Minister said, the Department of Education has published a paper on the OECD's Education at a Glance report. This briefing paper outlines how through using the alternative measure of GNI*, education expenditure in 2020 as a percentage of GNI* stood at 5.8%. This compares favourably with the OECD average for educational expenditure as a percentage of national income, which stood at 5.1% in 2020. The document also looks at Ireland's spend on education as a percentage of total Government spending. This also compares well internationally.

I think I need to conclude there.

I thank the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach. I also thank Deputies McGrath and Healy-Rae for their kind words, and Independents across Ireland South who helped me in the recent election campaign.

In the limited time available to me, I will very much focus on this motion, which is very important. I find the Government's rationale around GDP and the proportion of GDP spending to be somewhat unconvincing in that the use of GNI* as a measure of the Irish economy is contentious in many respects. For example, the Government has to pay towards the EU budget or various measures that are measured in accordance with GDP. It is GDP that is used. The idea that because our corporation tax levels are somewhat bloated, or may appear bloated to the European Union, we should therefore use GNI* is not an excuse not to use those taxes. Even if these are windfall taxes that there is a question mark over in the long term, we could use those taxes now to benefit children now because those children are our future. It is incredibly short-sighted for the Government to state it will only spend in accordance with GNI* percentages, and not use this bonanza we have with corporation taxes by putting it into something like education, which is a long-term benefit to the State. The reason income from our corporation taxes is so high is companies are here. The reason they came here, even before our corporation tax rate was set as it is, is that we have a highly educated young workforce. If that is to continue, we need to invest in that.

I will draw the attention of the House to a couple of matters. Some 98% of all children with special educational needs are in mainstream provision. That is excellent, but we need to invest in that to maintain it. If we do not continue to invest, we will not be in that situation. When I was in primary school, for example, children with special needs were not able to avail of mainstream education and were not in our schools. It is a requirement of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that people are entitled, under Article 24, to an inclusive education. Of course, we have not opted into that so the failings cannot be challenged.

The funding model that removes the criteria of complex needs is particularly important. This was removed from assessments. It means that many SEN mainstream pupils will not be recognised as needing supports until at least second class, by which time they will have been four years in the primary education system and will have already incurred a considerable disadvantage. The motion calls on the Government to address that.

I am interested in what will happen. I have seen numerous motions being accepted by the Government, including some of mine, that nothing happens as a result of. Does this Dáil exert any control over the Government? That is a fundamental question.

I congratulate Deputy McNamara. I send my condolences to the Ó Muircheartaigh family. I commend Deputy Harkin on putting the motion forward.

The same problem is in schools throughout the country, and in work and the price of work and so on. What no one understands is that over the past number of years, costs have gone up. Unfortunately, the likes of the capitation grant, and I have been on a board of management, is like loaves and fishes. People are trying to see how they can save money to keep schools going. I remember being on a school board of management. Parents had to get together to do a big draw to make sure the school kept going. It costs the same to heat a school, as it has different rooms, for 50 pupils as for 80 pupils for the simple reason that the separate rooms are still needed for the different number of children. Unfortunately, principals are under ferocious pressure in national schools to try to make sure that schools are kept going. I know that solar panels and new things are coming on stream, which are welcome. I am not putting down the likes of that, but inflation and the costs involved have put real pressure on smaller schools. They need help.

On top of that, I look at the way SNAs are being given to schools at present. Schools could get half an SNA position. It was done in a fairer way at one time than the way it is being done now. We need to make sure that children with disabilities get every opportunity to be brought into mainstream education. They deserve the same as anybody else.

The Minister told us she recognises the challenges facing schools in regard to funding. There is only one way to deal with that, which is to increase the levels of funding. Unless we say principals and teachers are making up the figures they presented to us - I do not believe they are - as I said, it is essential that a very significant increase in funding is delivered in the next budget.

Having listened to the Minister's speech, I have to echo some of my colleagues' requests. Are we talking about the same education system? The Minister noted that our pupil-teacher ratio is now at a historic low of 23:1. I recognise her efforts in that regard but the OECD average is 20:1. All we are asking is for that ratio to be reduced to the average.

My colleague, Deputy Connolly, spoke in detail about the need to enforce the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004. While enforcing legislation does not grab headlines in the same way as providing extra funding, if enforced, this legislation would provide a legislative basis for the delivery as of right of SEN supports to those students who really need them. That is absolutely crucial. It is how our system should and must operate. The Minister has said that a review of the Act has commenced but when will it report? Crucially, when will the Government implement the Act in full? We need answers on this.

The Minister has told us that she has employed extra numbers of deputy principals but the reality is that 1,700 middle management roles were lost in primary education 15 years ago and so far only 500 have been reinstated. She also spoke about the capitation grant. That grant is now back to pre-2011 levels. That is not progress. It is not even catching up. Those figures tell us everything we need to know about the crisis in primary funding.

If there is one thing I want to ask of the Minister, it is this: I appeal to her to reinstate complex needs as a criterion and to allow school principals to input this information on the primary online database. Why will the Minister not trust principals and teachers? They know their students and they have the data. It takes years for students to get a diagnosis. The CDNT waiting list is getting longer and longer. It takes students years and years to get treatment but those students are still in our schools. They are in mainstream classes and many do not get proper supports until they are in second class. If there is one thing in this motion that I would push harder for than for anything else, it is that. This must change. It comes down to the fact that the Department and the NCSE do not want this information. There was a box that could be ticked on the primary online database but it has been removed so there is now no way for schools to send this information to the Department. That has to change.

There is a crisis in primary education funding. There is chronic and ongoing underinvestment in the sector. For the sake of our students, families, teachers, principals and, indeed, the entire system, the Government must absolutely ensure that the level of funding for primary schools is significantly increased in budget 2025. Nothing less is acceptable.