Paul Nicholas Gogarty
Question:431 Mr. Gogarty asked the Minister for Education and Science the practical steps which have been or are planned to be implemented to tackle the historical anomaly in the way voluntary schools are funded. [1640/03]
Written Answers. - Voluntary Secondary Schools.
Significant improvements have been made in the funding of second level schools. The standard per capita grant increased from €224.74 in 1997 to €256.49 in September 2001 and was further increased to €266.49 in September 2002. An additional per capita grant of €38.09 is paid to disadvantaged schools bringing the total per capita grant in the case of such schools to over €300. In addition, under the school services support initiative, second level schools have benefited from further significant increases in the support grant from €25.40 per pupil in 2000 to €88.88 from September 2002 and to €99 per pupil from 1 January 2003.
Funding for voluntary secondary schools has been further enhanced by the introduction of a range of equalisation measures designed to reduce the historic anomalies referred to in the funding arrangements for the different school types at second level. Under the terms of recent equalisation measures, the support services grant was increased by €28 per pupil with effect from September 2002, bringing the support services grant in the case of voluntary secondary schools to €116.88 per pupil from September 2002 and to €127 per pupil from 1 January 2003. This increase is in addition to the range of equalisation grants of up to €15,554 per school, €44.44 per pupil, per annum that was approved for secondary schools in December 2001. For a voluntary secondary school with 500 pupils, this amounts to extra funding of up to €100,000 per annum, and annual grants of up to €236,761, €255,811 in the case of disadvantaged schools, towards general expenses and support services.