Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 29 January 2015
166. Deputy Pat Deering asked the Minister for Education and Skills if an application for partial redundancy for a special needs assistant (details supplied) in County Kilkenny was received in her Department; and if a decision regarding same has been made. [4255/15]
View answer167. Deputy Pat Deering asked the Minister for Education and Skills if her attention has been drawn to the fact that if special needs assistants change school they may be excluded from receiving a redundancy payment even though they continue to work for her Department, due to the respective boards of management being their employer in theory; and her plans to correct this apparent anomaly. [4256/15]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 166 and 167 together.
The person referred to by the Deputy was employed in a full time Special Needs Assistant (SNA) post until 31 August 2014. From that date, the post in question became surplus to the allocation of SNAs to the school and the SNA was deemed to be a member of the SNA Supplementary Assignment Panel.
The person referred to, obtained a part time SNA post (0.83 of a full time post) in another school from 1 September 2014 via the SNA Supplementary Assignment Panel mechanism. As outlined in my Department's Circular 44/2014 (Recruitment of Special Needs Assistants – Supplementary Assignment Arrangements for the 2014/2015 school year) and the accompanying FAQ document, an SNA who is deemed to be a member of the Supplementary Assignment Panel and who is appointed to a further SNA position on or before 1 June 2015 will carry forward any service that s/he has already accrued as an SNA with their previous employer. This will be carried forward and reckonable, for redundancy purposes only, if a future redundancy situation arises in respect of that person. As a result, the person referred to by the Deputy is not at this point entitled to a compensation payment in respect of the difference between the full time post and the part time post. However, the previous service will be carried forward and reckonable, for redundancy purposes only, if a future redundancy situation arises for this person.
