Debate contribution: Summer Schemes in Special Schools: Cancellation

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 31 March 2026.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

31 March 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Summer Schemes in Special Schools: Cancellation

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5471283

Read the official Assembly record

Text

What happened last week was a masterclass in chaos by the Executive. The Education Authority announced on Thursday that summer schemes in special schools would not go ahead this year. There was no consultation with parents and no alternative was offered. Instead, there was just a cold bureaucratic announcement that upended the lives of thousands of families overnight. Parents were left devastated. We have heard accounts of parents who were unable to sleep on Thursday night as they were consumed with worry about how they would manage the summer and the cost of private care that they simply cannot afford. I will wager that the Education Minister slept soundly that night because he thought that it was not his problem to solve. The parents were the ones who carried that anxiety and bore the weight of his abject failure. The cruellest part of this shameful episode is that it did not have to happen at all. In fewer than 24 hours, both Ministers performed a full U-turn: the nursing support was found, and the schemes were back on — problem solved, or so we were told. The question that every parent is now entitled to ask, and to which we need an answer, is this: if the resources were there all along, why were families put through that torment? I hope that the Ministers can answer that question. The answer is that the schemes were simply not a priority until the parents and the public made themselves impossible to ignore. I commend those parents for their immediate and furious opposition, which forced those Ministers to do the right thing. That pressure worked last week, and it can work again. I have also been contacted by parents of children with additional needs, including those with severe learning difficulties, who attend mainstream schools. They have no summer schemes to avail themselves of, and they should not be punished because they lost out in the lottery of school placements. Those families want to see wholescale reform of a broken system and full equality across the board for children with SEN. As Alma White and others have said, if a U-turn is possible in 24 hours, what else could we achieve with genuine political will in 24 hours, weeks and months? The same logic applies across the Executive's record of failure. Caleb's cause campaigners are absolutely right that parents should be able to access SEN provision for their children beyond the age of 19, and that fight must be won, but they have also been failed by the Executive. The senseless decision not to ring-fence the Youth Service budget could also be reversed, which would guarantee thousands of young people the safe spaces, youth workers and late-night provision that they desperately need and deserve. We should also not lose sight of the fact that adults with disabilities and additional needs are failed on the daily by the Executive. Some of my constituents pay several thousand pounds a year for ADHD medication and other associated healthcare treatments because they cannot get a diagnosis and support from our underfunded and failing health service. My constituents and, no doubt, those of others, lose a large sum of money every month from their personal independence payments because they have been put in care homes instead of supported living places, because, lo and behold, those places do not exist. People with disabilities are being failed as well. I missed the start of the contribution by the Member who proposed the motion, but I do not disagree with anything that I heard him say. However, his party and Sinn Féin should be careful because they constantly talk about making efficiencies and savings in services, and this is where that road leads. In recent times, every time you have talked about efficiencies and railed against the duplication of resources, people with disabilities are the ones who have been put on the chopping block. I urge those Members to be careful about that political approach. Rumours are swirling that there may be a deal in the Executive about the local growth fund. I do not know, and I am not part of the Executive. However, the disastrous decision by Westminster to strip away the local growth fund will have a massive impact on front-line services, threatening hundreds of jobs and tens of thousands of vulnerable people in the process. The Executive can and should step in today — right now — and prevent that catastrophe.

Last week's fiasco proved one thing: bad decisions are not inevitable; they are choices that can be reversed when ordinary people refuse to accept them.

768 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:16 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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