Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Three hundred and forty schools have completed the programme and 120,000 places are being provided. We are providing places at double the rate that obtained when the Deputy's party was previously in government. We have expanded. Of course there are demands. There is a growing number of children, particularly at second level, but also at primary level. This is a period of very high demand for additional resources for new buildings. We have had to prioritise new places above and beyond other areas of desirable capital expenditure. That is why PE hall provision is not part of our capital expenditure programme at present. As part of the capital plan, however, we have recognised that both PE halls and laboratory facilities require investment. We will be investing but it will not be in the medium term. In the immediate term, 80% of money must go towards getting places for the children who are coming through.

I have acknowledged there is more use of prefabs but there will be a programme of prefab replacement from 2019 onwards. We have to use the money made available each year as best we can. I assure the Deputies that we are investing more money and delivering significant major investments. We have 200 new schools. There are currently 85 projects under construction or progressing to construction this year. Therefore, projects are continuing to flow through. We never hand back a ha'penny of the money that is allocated to us. We make sure that every penny in education capital that is allocated is spent. That means building a supply chain of projects that are ready to roll.

On the issue of schools where there are demographic pressures, the Department is currently undertaking a demographic exercise to consider not only population trends, child benefit claims and the number of children in preschool but also the local authority housing projects that are in the pipeline, and it is factoring these data into the assessment of where new schools and new school accommodation are needed.