To ask the Scottish Executive how many children in (a) public and (b) private education have currently been identified as having learning difficulties such as dyslexia.

The Scottish Executive, through its annual school census, collects information on the main learning difficulty of all pupils attending special schools and those pupils with a Record of Needs who attend publicly funded or independent mainstream schools. Figures for 2001 are 17,451 pupils attending publicly funded schools, of whom 1,501 had specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia, and 1,063 pupils attending independent schools, of whom 40 had specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia.