Vol. 531 No. 3
413 Mr. McGrath asked the Minister for Education and Science if, further to parliamentary questions concerning funding for VTOS programmes under the aegis of Westmeath VEC, he will comment on the reason the average allowance, per student, for non-pay items such as rent, class materials, IT equipment and others has decreased from £1,013 in 1997 to £738 in 2000 despite the fact that costs for these items have significantly increased. [5448/01]
The Department funds the operational costs of the vocational training opportunity scheme, VTOS, in the form of grants to vocational education committees which cover (a) pay, (b) non-pay and (c) training, travel and meal allowances. The non-pay element of the grant is used to cover the costs of premises, equipment, books and other overheads. VTOS students attend courses either in core, stand alone, class groups, or as students dispersed on other programmes, such as PLC or leaving certificate courses. For core groups, the non-pay funding norm is £15,000 per annum per group of 20. For dispersed students, a grant of £500 per pupil is paid with the remaining costs covered by the normal non-pay grants for the particular programme. These norms are adjusted further to ensure that the grants paid do not exceed the VEC's projected expenditure in any year, and to take account of any surpluses on hand at the end of the preceding year. In addition, to give added advantage, the number of core students may be rounded upwards to a complete group, and a corresponding adjustment made to the dispersed rate of grant.
Consequently, although the funding norms for VTOS have not changed, the actual unit costs per student issued may vary from year to year depending on fluctuations in class group size, funds on hands and expenditure incurred, and the numbers of core versus dispersed students. The primary costs for overheads arise by virtue of the number of class groups, rather than the number of students within each group.
The development of VTOS features strongly in the Back to Education Initiative, as set out in the recent White Paper on Adult Education Learning for Life. Under this measure, £1.027 billion will be provided under the national development plan over the period of the plan for the development of a number of programmes, including VTOS, which will involve a significant expansion of part-time options. The resources for the programme will be examined in that context.
