Education Minister Ruairi Quinn has been forced to make a u-turn and reverse his decision to cut resource teaching hours to school children with special needs.

The Cabinet has agreed to release 500 additional teaching posts to schools in September to cope with the rise in the number of children needing support.

The minister warned the “one-off” measure will have budgetary implications for his department in October.

Mr Quinn, who has ordered a review of the allocation of resource teachers, said the level of additional supports to students from September will remain at the 2012/13 levels.

“This is a good day for special education, an area that I have passionately defended since coming into office,” he said.

“I have succeeded in protecting the €1.3bn currently spent in this area.”

The Government came under fire last week for announcing savage education cuts that would hit the country’s most vulnerable children while the State continues to bail out bankers and developers.

But officials maintained a record number of pupils applying for extra support and special educational needs left them with no choice but to slash resource hours in schools nationwide.

More than 42,500 students need additional teaching support from September, compared with 38,400 pupils last year. The figures includes 22,000 pupils, up 2,000, who will be supported by 10,575 special needs assistants

The 500 posts had been set aside to meet the demand expected to arise over the remainder of the next school year as new pupils are assessed.

Labour TD Patrick Nulty last week resigned from the party over its political decisions in government, including cutting resource hours to children with special needs.

Mr Quinn appointed Eamon Stack, a former chief inspector in the department, to chair a working group to develop a new model for allocating resource teachers in schools.

Established by the National Council for Special Education (NCSE), the group will include parents and will report back to the minister in September on how to reform the system.

“Parents can be assured that their children will not be disadvantaged while we are moving towards a new model that will ensure greater fairness and quality of education for children with special educational needs,” Mr Quinn said.

The group will also probe the reasons for the unprecedented 12% rise in applications for resource teacher support this year, compared with an annual 1.3% increase last September.

Mr Quinn said he is gravely concerned about the scale of the surge in demand for resource teachers this year which, if it was to continue, would make the current system unsustainable.

“There is evidence that the current model used to allocate resources is flawed,” he added.

“This is creating an inequitable distribution of resource teaching hours.

“It has been found that pupils with special educational needs in some schools in better-off areas get more support than those from disadvantaged areas.”

The latest 10% cut would have left a pupil allocated 4.15 additional teaching hours each week last year with just 3.45 hours - a 25% drop in supports since 2010/2011 levels.

Fianna Fáil had called for a Dáil debate on the issue to reverse what it described as “a deeply damaging cut” that would have hit every school in the country.

Education spokesman Charlie McConalogue said the proposed cut directly contradicted the Government’s decision to match the increase in pupil numbers with an increase in mainstream teachers in September.

“This erosion of special education must stop,” said Mr McConalogue.