1317. Deputy Jen Cummins asked the Minister for Education and Youth to outline the reasoning for media reports stating The Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot is to be shelved. [62621/26]

I am pleased to confirm that the Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot and the Education Wellbeing Practitioner in Schools Pilot are not being discontinued. Recent media reports suggesting otherwise were inaccurate, and the resulting coverage may have caused understandable confusion regarding the pilot’s continuation.

In August I published the Evaluation of the Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot (CPS-P). I welcomed the evaluation, which demonstrated the positive benefits of providing one-to-one counselling for children with mild to moderate mental health needs in all schools in Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan and Tipperary and Education Wellbeing Practitioners (EWPs), a new school-based support service in 77 schools across Cork, Carlow, Dublin 7 and Dublin 16. These supports made a significant difference to the wellbeing of children, families and school communities. The positive results from the pilot has already informed the expansion of these supports.

In October 2024, my department announced the extension of the Pilot to 61 urban DEIS primary schools in Tallaght, Clondalkin, Finglas, Ballymun and Darndale. The schools included in the extension of the pilot were identified by my department as supporting children from areas with some of the highest levels of disadvantage in the State. I also recently announced the extension of this counselling provision to the 102 primary schools in the DEIS Plus scheme and access to an Education Wellbeing Practitioner for the 102 primary and 27 post primary schools in the DEIS Plus scheme. To date, 20 Education Wellbeing Practitioners have been recruited to the four cluster areas and offer a weekly presence in schools. The supports being offered are to pupils, parents, and school staff to support the wellbeing and resilience of the school community. In June 2026 a new recruitment campaign was launched to further expand the number of Education Wellbeing Practitioners under the DEIS Plus Scheme, in primary schools with an extension to post-primary schools. Recruitment is in progress and onboarding is expected to take place over the coming weeks.

My department has set up county panels of pre-approved private counsellors providing one-to-one counselling in primary schools in counties Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan and Tipperary, and the Dublin DEIS schools. There are currently 44 counsellors working in schools across the seven pilot counties and 11 on the Dublin Deis panel. In December 2024, following a competitive tendering process, Cpl Healthcare were engaged by the Department to support the recruitment of counsellors. Cpl Healthcare are also actively recruiting counsellors and Cpl counsellors are providing counselling in schools. Additionally, my department is continuing its efforts to raise awareness about the Counselling Pilot through all relevant counsellor accrediting bodies.

While specialist mental health assessment and therapeutic services remain the responsibility of the Department of Health and the HSE, the pilot and the evaluation have demonstrated that school-based supports can complement these services by building resilience, strengthening wellbeing and supporting early intervention.

The evaluation found that one-to-one counselling provided valuable, targeted support for individual children. However, the scalability of this component was limited by challenges in securing qualified and accredited counsellors, as well as ensuring appropriate referrals for the short-term counselling. In contrast, providing schools with access to Education Wellbeing Practitioners demonstrated particular strengths in reaching a wider range of pupils, parents and school staff. By combining early intervention, prevention and whole-school approaches, the EWP model showed strong potential as a sustainable and scalable approach to supporting wellbeing across school communities, while helping to ensure that children receive appropriate support at the earliest possible stage.