Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 16 May 2024

Public Accounts Committee

2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education

9:30 am

Photo of John BradyJohn Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein)
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This is an annual occurrence. It is not a one-off occurrence in the Greystones area. Unfortunately, Ms McNally's words ring hollow to this pupil and his family and to the other families who are in a similar situation to the parents and pupils of last year, the year before that and so on. There is a cyclical failure by the Department to deal with this.

Ms McNally said that forward planning is working. We know that in Greystones, for example, the population target has already exceeded the target for 2030. Six years prior to achieving the population target, planning applications are now being refused by the local authority because the 2030 target has been exceeded. What kind of interaction is there with Wicklow County Council and other local authorities on that forward planning piece? There seems to be a real failure to say that the school places are not available and that the brakes need to be applied. While houses are needed, we also need the critical infrastructure such as school places. We have a problem here and we are not in a position to provide those school places. What kind of interaction is happening with local authorities such as Wicklow County Council?