Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

What is another year in terms of primary school education, particularly in Dublin West? It is another period of agony for parents and children as they wait to find out whether they will get a school place at primary or second level. Last August the Minister made her first visit to Dublin West in a formal capacity to see a primary school. I noticed that she came when the school was empty apart from one token child in a school uniform to allow the school appear spacious. The very successful Castleknock community college has 60 children on a waiting list for a place. Across the road in St. Patrick's school in Diswellstown, the one the Minister visited last year when it was empty of children, has 200 children seeking 89 places. These figures indicate the lottery for parents with four or five year olds seeking a school place.

I recently spoke to a parent with a daughter already in Mary Mother of Hope school in Clonee. Another daughter of his turned four in January and although this is a sibling place she is 23rd on a waiting list for a place in the school. I am told more than 60 children are now on that waiting list. I have sent the Minister personal correspondence about the much-loved village school in Mulhuddart, which is apparently to be closed at the instigation of the Minister and her colleague, the Minister of State. The children are to be transferred to a new super-sized primary school with capacity for more than 1,000 pupils, to be located two to three miles away from the existing school, about which no consultation took place with the parents. The class teachers have suggested to existing pupils that if they have a brother or sister due to start next year he or she will be in another school two or three miles away.

The Minister has ducked and weaved and avoided responsibility to an extraordinary degree regarding Dublin West. I also refer to Diswellstown in the Clonee area that is serving a population living in more than 8,000 houses built in the past ten years. The Minister promised a second level school for the area, but it now appears that it will not be built until 2008-09 or later. All the parents in these areas, as the Minister must recall from her visit last year, are working and buying houses with large mortgage repayments. They are paying their taxes and are not the people with Ansbacher accounts. They are doing it right and paying their way. They are contributing to society. Is it too much to expect that they might get a school place for their children?

Last year after months of tabling parliamentary questions, the Minister finally supplied an answer on class sizes. Nine schools in Dublin 15 had 89 classes of 30 children or more out of a total of 155 classes — 57% of the classes were super-sized classes. I have no reason to believe the situation this year is any different and although I have asked for the information repeatedly by way of parliamentary question, this term and last term, and although the Department collected the statistics towards the end of September, the Minister obviously believes the Dáil can go into recess and the general election without feeling obliged to acknowledge the figures for Dublin West. In other areas the Minister appears to have much concern for education but her performance and that of her predecessors in regard to Dublin West is truly appalling. The core reason for what has happened is that her party is in hock to the developers who are building the houses and making fortunes and neither she nor her predecessors have had the courage to get the sites. She is telling us she will do it now. She told us last week there will be a new VEC-patroned primary school for children who get into no school. When will we know about this? The school places are being allocated in Dublin West at present.

To my knowledge there are 400 children in Dublin West with no school to go to at either primary or second level. Can one imagine the uncertainty in those families? The parents of those at primary level are trying to make a hard decision. Should they hope for the best that the child will get a place and give up their preschool place or crèche place? What does the Minister advise these parents to do? Should they hold on in the hope that in May when the general election is on the rounds that she and the Taoiseach will cobble together another solution? She is building super-sized primary schools in Dublin West. No primary school in Dublin West is to be for fewer than 1,000 pupils. This is a bit of political magic because this is to happen on a site half the size of that for traditional primary schools. On some of these half size sites there is to be an Educate Together school on one side of the site and a traditional Catholic parish school on the other side of the site. What about activity and children being free to run around? These are three-storey schools in half size sites with twice the number of pupils. If this is what the Government is delivering to the parents of Dublin West all I can say is that when the general election comes, I hope they will give their answer.

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