Capitation Grants
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-13
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Michael Moynihan (FF), Cork North-West

I thank the Senator for the opportunity to outline the capitation issue to the Seanad. I thank him for his ongoing engagement on education issues. He has been in contact with me over many of them. It is important public representatives continue to engage positively in relation to education.
The Government is committed to increasing funding to support schools and the programme for Government commits to increasing capitation funding to schools of all types to ensure schools can meet everyday running costs. As we all know, they are increasing. The commitment builds on the progress made in recent years. The Department secured an extra €39 million in budget 2026 towards increased capitation funding for primary, post-primary and special schools to provide additional financial supports towards their running costs. This will see an increase in the standard capitation rates paid to schools of €50 per pupil for primary schools, from €224 to €274, and of €20 per student for post-primary schools, from €386 to €406. This will also allow for an increase of €20 in capitation rates for urban band one DEIS primary schools, increasing the mainstream primary rate in these schools to €294. The increased capitation rates will also see special schools receiving the same rates of mainstream capitation for young people aged 12 and over as for their peers in mainstream post-primary schools. These increases will take effect from September 2026. The funding will benefit schools around the country in managing their day-to-day running costs. Schools will receive their next capitation payment in June. The increases announced in budget 2026 are in addition to the 12% increases as part of budget 2025. The past three budgets have resulted in an increase in the level of capitation grant rates of almost 50%, 49.7%, or €91 to primary and 28.5%, or €90, to post-primary schools.
The Department is committed to providing funding to recognised primary and post-primary schools in the free education system by way of per capita grants. The two main grants are the capitation grant to cater for day-to-day running costs of a school such as heating, lighting, cleaning, insurance and general upkeep and the ancillary grant to cater for the cost of employing ancillary services staff. Schools have flexibility to use the capitation fund provided for general running costs and ancillary funding provided for caretaking and secretarial services as a common grant from which the board of management can allocate according to its own priorities except for the employment of relevant secretaries as per Circular 0036/2022. Primary schools with fewer than 60 pupils are paid the capitation rate and the ancillary grants on the basis of having 60 pupils. Enhanced rates are also paid in respect of pupils with special educational needs and Traveller pupils. To ensure that schools are supported to get the best value for money for their spending, the Office of Government Procurement, OGP, frameworks are available to schools for a number of categories including facilities management, managed services, professional services and utilities. Schools are encouraged to avail of the available OGP procurement frameworks. The financial support services unit, FSSU, funded by the Department is an important source of advice and support to schools on financial matters. The Senator mentioned Sixmilebridge and others. It is important that if there are challenges within school communities that they reach out to the unit as a matter of urgency. We are committed to continuing to increase capitation as we have done over the past number of years.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-13/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:56+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-13