Violet-Anne Wynne
Question:171. Deputy Violet-Anne Wynne asked the Minister for Education how the people of Clare will benefit from her Department’s allocations in Budget 2024; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [45770/23]
View answerWednesday, 18 October 2023
Questions (171)
Written answers
I can confirm to the Deputy that Budget 2024 provides an increase of €421 million in core current funding to my Department's Vote, as well as over €80 million in core capital funding. An additional €170 million is also being provided in the Vote as part of Cost of Living and COVID-19 supports. These additional funds build on significant increases in recent budgets and further enhance the investment in Ireland’s primary and post-primary education system. The significant increased investment is the largest Education budget in the history of the state and reflects the government’s commitment to a quality inclusive school system and improved learning outcomes for every student.
The key features include:
• Some €67 million funding for free schoolbooks and classroom resources for Junior Cycle students. This will bring total investment in free school books at primary and post-primary school level to some €115 million.
• Over €20 million in additional capitation funding to assist schools now and longer term with increased day-to-day running costs. This will support a permanent restoration of funding for all primary and post-primary schools, increasing the basic rate of capitation to €200 per student in primary schools and to €345 in post-primary schools.
• In addition, to particularly support schools this year with inflationary pressures, an additional €60 million in cost of living supports has been secured, which will be paid to all primary and post-primary schools in the free scheme.
• €92 million in additional funding for the School Transport Scheme to provide additional places for children with special educational needs, increased bus contractor costs and a continued reduction in school transport fees.
• €82 million for an additional 1,216 Special Needs Assistants and 744 additional Special Educational Needs Teachers in classrooms providing for 2,700 new places for children with special educational needs.
• Provision of an additional €11 million for special schools catering for children with special educational needs to remove the threshold for the appointment of an Administrative Deputy Principal and provide for a further 100 teaching posts.
• €20 million in funding for the Enhanced Summer Programme totalling €40 million for summer 2024.
• Additional allocation for curricular reforms, which includes funding for the accelerated roll out of the Senior Cycle Redevelopment programme and the delivery of additional physical activity initiatives in schools.
• Additional allocation for social inclusion measures, including enhancing the capacity of the Tusla Education Support Services and additional educational welfare officer posts.
• Actions to address teacher supply issues through an incentive scheme to partially refund future Professional Masters in Education (PME) fees and additional upskilling teacher programmes for in-demand subjects.
• Additional posts of responsibility allocated to assist the leadership and management in schools.
• A capital allocation of €940 million for 2024 for the addition of essential capacity in schools through building new schools and the roll-out of additional accommodation in existing schools.
• Under Project Ireland 2040, the school sector will receive a total of approximately €4.4 billion capital investment over the period 2021-2025
The budget for my Department is not allocated or recorded on a county basis. I am, therefore, not in a position to provide specific details on the amounts allocated to County Clare. I can, however, indicate that the measures cited above will have a positive impact on school communities in Clare.