Mattie McGrath
Question:760. Deputy Mattie McGrath asked the Minister for Education to outline her plans to improve the pay and conditions for special needs assistants; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [39153/23]
View answerMonday, 11 September 2023
Questions (760)
Written answers
The Government is committed to the delivery of quality public services, and continues to approach public service pay in a balanced way that is reasonable and fair to both public servants and to the taxpayer. This has been achieved through a series of national collective agreements, agreed between trade unions and the Government, applying across the public sector. In the last year the current agreement, ‘Building Momentum’, has provided for further increases of 6.5% to October 2023, with an initial 3% increase backdated to February 2022, which provided a lump sum to SNAs during the previous winter period, a 2% salary increase in March of this year and a further increase of €750 to their salary to take effect in October 2023. The starting pay for an SNA will increase further to around €28,000 by October 2023, and SNAs will see increases from €2,500 to €3,500 per annum under the salary increases. SNA’s have also benefited from the application of an increase of €1,100 to the current long service increment point, raising the maximum pay level for a SNA, through Building Momentum’s ‘sectoral bargaining’ process.
In terms of improving conditions for SNAs in our schools, the Department has established an SNA Workforce Development Unit (SNAWDU) in order to ensure that sufficient time and attention is given to examination of the SNA role and any reform or development required. This dedicated unit enables a strategic approach to SNA policy development with the objective of developing an enhanced SNA service which delivers the best outcome for children with significant care needs in our schools.
A priority task for this Unit has been the review of the SNA Contract of Employment in line with a commitment under the Building Momentum National Pay Agreement. An extensive review of the SNA contract is progressing in collaboration with internal stakeholders in my Department. Once this stage concludes the draft SNA contract will be provided to the education partners and relevant external stakeholders for consideration and feedback. The SNAWDU also recently convened focus groups with SNAs around the country as a first step in establishing a learning and development programme for SNAs. A dedicated SNA Information Hub was set up on foot of direct feedback from the SNAs in these focus group. The Information Hub, which contains useful information and links to resources for SNAs, can be accessed at the following link: gov.ie/en/publication/2a977-special-needs-assistant-sna/.