asked the Minister for Education the criteria used by her Department in determining whether it is necessary to establish a remedial teaching post in a particular school; whether these posts are permanent or may be withdrawn in light of diminished need; and the number of new remedial posts that have been sanctioned in the last 12 months.

A number of factors is taken into account in determining whether it is necessary to allocate a remedical teacher to a particular school, the principal of which are: the size of the school, and socio-economic background of its catchment area; the number of pupils in need of remedial tuition, and the pupils' individual degrees of learning difficulty.

The post of remedial teacher is a permanent one, but the teacher may be shared by several schools or be redeployed among individual schools. In the primary school area where there are 3,247 national schools, a remedial teaching service is provided to approximately 1,100 of these through 857 posts of remedial teachers.

In post-primary schools almost 300 ex-quota posts are available for remedial teachers. Also, some 650 second level teachers have participated in the Department's course in remedial education.

As regards additional appointments, I announced yesterday the appointment of an additional 30 remedial teachers, 95 additional teaching posts for disadvantaged schools and the establishment of the pilot projects about which I spoke.

Also, as no detailed documentation on remedial education had been provided for schools, my Department issued guidelines on remedial education in 1988.