Ned O'Keeffe (Cork East, Fianna Fail)

I am delighted to be here to discuss this matter with my colleague in east Cork, Deputy Stanton, on the opposite side. We met the school authorities last night, Rev. Cannon and the principal of the school, and they put before us the proposals which I discussed with the Minister this afternoon. She was quite helpful to me in her initial consideration of the matter. It is a unique situation where a developer, who is a friend of mine from Mallow, County Cork, is prepared to invest heavily in the Midleton area and, as Deputy Stanton said, invest €2.5 million in a new school. East Cork has many Gaelscoileanna which have been provided by the Government. There is a new school in Mallow, a fine refurbished school in Fermoy, new schools in Cobh, Youghal and Fermoy. Midleton is the only one outstanding of the six large towns in the constituency.

I have no doubt the Minister, who has such a great knowledge of Irish, is so fluent in it and has such love for it, will provide for this school in Midleton. It well deserves her attention. As a result of the explosion in numbers the school will have 11 teachers on the payroll for the school year 2006-07. I do not want to labour the issue, but as Deputy Stanton said, the school is in the community hall through the goodwill of the community in Midleton. The Minister, Deputy Martin, provided the licence for that and it was through my intervention some years ago that the existing facility was set up, but it is no longer suitable, as the Minister understands. Both I and Deputy Stanton, who has taken an interesting position on this, look forward to her reply. I am confident that as a result of the Minister's role in education and what she has demonstrated this evening we will have success and that she will accept this unique offer of a developer, probably one of the first in the country outside of Dublin.

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