Recently, in accordance with the confidence and supply agreement, there was a circular issued to schools in regard to guidance counselling. There has been a lot of worry in schools that this circular did not ring-fence guidance counselling. The Taoiseach provided a note to my leader, Deputy Micheál Martin, which made clear that the guidance provision was ex quota but that has not been made clear to schools, and schools are now going ahead on the basis that it is not ex quota. I suggest that the note the Taoiseach gave to Deputy Micheál Martin be issued immediately to all the schools in the country to which it is relevant.

I will ask the Minister to respond to that.

The position is that we have made provision in a circular that the provision for guidance counselling would be ring-fenced. It is in accordance with the approach to guidance counselling, which is a whole-school guidance counselling approach, that was adopted by Deputy Thomas Byrne's leader in the 2000s. At this stage, we have restored 50% of the provision. It will rise to 66% this coming September.

Deputy Thomas Byrne raised with me concerns that the management bodies had issued some directive. We have confirmed with them that there has not been any such directive. We are issuing the provision. We are ensuring that this is a ring-fenced provision for guidance counselling. We will, if necessary, inspect to ensure that. We will be conducting a survey to establish fully the practise that is going on.