99 Mr. Hughes asked the Minister for Education the action, if any, she is taking to resolve the internal dispute in her Department regarding the handling of new material, including examination material for the leaving certificate applied programme. [7765/97]

The assessment of students' tasks relating to the leaving certificate applied programme had been originally scheduled to be undertaken last month but was postponed due to industrial action taken by members of the Public Service Executive Union. I am pleased to say that agreement has been reached with the union to allow arrangements to continue for the processing of work relating to these assessments. Arrangements are currently being made to reschedule the postponed assessments.