John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

For this particular site, where a decision was taken to spend €8.4 million of taxpayers’ money on a site that was zoned for retail, not for educational purposes, civic amenity or anything else, what engagement had there been with the local authority with regard to the zoning of the site and the prospect of having a change from retail purposes to educational? Was there any due diligence or was any engagement taken with the local authority to ensure that process would be straightforward or that the local authority would be willing to look at that, or not? What engagement had taken place and what assurances had been given by the local authority?