Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)

If somebody dropped in from Mars they would think there was an election coming. How does one explain that in west Dublin, east Meath, Kildare and many other areas of rapidly expanding population in this State hundreds of children wanting to start primary school this September have no classrooms to go to? The Government made no provision for them, leaving hard-working parents angry and frustrated and in crisis. That has been a staggering feature of the current Government for more than ten years. It gave complete freedom to developers to construct tens of thousands of houses and apartments in new areas but did not oblige them to provide social infrastructure at the same time, schools being one of the most vital. In some cases the Government allowed them to use their control of school sites to blackmail the Department of Education and Science and the local authority for millions of euro extra or for planning concessions. It allowed developers to hold children's education to ransom and they walked away with billions, leaving communities bereft. When one looks at the list of donations to Ministers and others by developers one might conclude that, perhaps, that is the explanation.

Since last September, 60 children in the Laytown and Bettystown area have been going to school in a gymnasium. Last June Deputy Cowley and I, representing the independent Deputies, made strong representations to the Minister for Education and Science on their behalf. We were promised that classrooms would be available for the new school year 2006-07. The children moved last week from the gym to the prefabricated buildings that were provided. Now 103 children in that area have nowhere to go in September. There are two schools with 630 children on one site of 2.5 acres. In Littlepace, Ongar in west Dublin we have three schools, one permanent and two temporary, cramped on to one site of 3.5 acres and dozens of children are now being excluded from schools in the area because there is no place in Clonsilla and Castleknock. The position is similar in Kildare. Pupils wanting to start secondary school face a similar crisis.

The Minister for Education and Science has been parading herself around teachers' conferences with an air of it being her first communion day, but she has dismally failed to make provision for new communities and secure school places for children, as would be normal. Will the Taoiseach set up a special unit, a schools emergency response unit, in the Department of Education and Science to address this crisis instantly, to go into talks with teachers, principals and parents in the area to ensure that each child will have a place this September in his or her local community and that there will be permanent provision from September 2008? That is what is desperately required. I want a commitment from the Taoiseach that that will happen.

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