Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I can understand why the Senator is advocating for Kildare, Newbridge and, as she said, not just those places but other smaller villages and towns in the vicinity. We want to make sure that as a State we provide an appropriate education for every child. Sometimes, there is not a streamlined approach between a primary school and a post-primary school, where a child may have received a really good education in a primary school and then is at a loss as to where to go for post-primary. We want to make sure that does not happen.

There is a huge body of work in the Department at present on forward planning for September 2024. These particular schools in the Senator’s constituency area have been asked for data, particularly in respect of first-year enrolments, so that the Department can ascertain where exactly places are needed. There will always be slightly moving parts to this because of new families coming in, people changing their minds, duplication of enrolment applications and so on, but some of that has to be factored into the general forward planning. The geographical information system, as I said, provides much information, such as child benefit data, school enrolment data and particularly around residential development activity, which of course needs to be taken into account also.