Ms Deirdre McDonnell:

I am here to talk about energy procurement. We ran an energy electricity competition in late 2013 that was open to all schools in the country. We received expressions of interest from around 1,700 schools. These were put into competition and contracts were provided to be signed. Savings in the region of 10% to 15% could be made on existing energy costs and overall the saving estimate from the competition was €1 million across all schools. This money was retained by schools that signed contracts and could be spent by them elsewhere. To date we have received around 1,300 contracts back and they are being processed by the Office of Government Procurement and the energy suppliers. Another 230 schools have signed up for the natural gas competitions that are being run and other energy contracts where savings can be achieved are open to schools. These projects are ongoing and details are on the Department's website. We are also working closely with school management bodies to involve them in promoting these competitions and encouraging schools to sign up.

The issue raised at the Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform is not within our area of responsibility. There are detailed guidelines for school boards of management, particularly at primary level where they are appointed for four years. Different rules and regulations apply to Education and Training Board, ETB, schools so we can examine the idea put forward at the Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform but we would have to see how it would fit within existing structures.