Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Question 212: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills his policy on prefab rental; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11017/12]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The overall policy goal of my Department is to ensure the highest standard of permanent accommodation for all schools. In the context of a rapidly increasing school population and competing pressure on the capital budget available to my Department, it is sometimes necessary to make use of temporary accommodation in order to meet the accommodation needs of schools.

The policy of my Department on renting prefabricated accommodation in individual cases depends on a number of factors including: - If the accommodation need is deemed short term, the policy is generally to approve temporary rental of accommodation. For example, a school may require a temporary building while it is awaiting the completion of construction of a permanent building. - Immediacy of requirement. In some cases, a school needs accommodation at very short notice and this can only be provided through temporary accommodation. In the past, that was provided by means of either rental or purchase of prefabricated buildings or the rental of other temporary accommodation such as local halls. My Department operates a policy of providing schools with the option of purchasing prefabs outright or providing a new build with the funding available where it is expected that the school will require the extra accommodation for more than three years.

In general, the Board of Management of a school is responsible for acquiring temporary accommodation, although this is not always the case. Where circumstances warrant, my Department procures the accommodation directly rather than through the school. This would arise for instance in a case where my Department is the owner of the site in question and would therefore be the client for any capital works.