Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)

Parents in Kilfinane, County Limerick will withdraw their children from school on Friday. They took this decision out of despair at the Government's failure to keep its promise. They are entitled to be told why the construction of their school has not been given the go ahead for this summer. No one has been able to explain why. Is it because they do not have enough political clout? The Minister stated that €586.2 million will be spent on schools this year, but not a penny will be spent on Kilfinane. There is no transparency about how the decision was made to build other schools, but not this one.

Kilfinane national school is at the bottom of the INTO's list of substandard schools, which Mr. John Carr, INTO general secretary, stated on radio this morning. It has been given numerous promises, has planning permission, has gone to tender and is the generic model for schools of its size, but the plug has been pulled. My colleague, Mr. James Heffernan, who lives in Kilfinane and is a past pupil of the school, tells me that people cannot believe they are being bypassed, given the school's condition. The children must queue in the yard to go to the toilet. The reason for the queue, shown on the front of yesterday's Irish Examiner, is that the teachers cannot let them go to the toilet when they need to because the teachers cannot, for health and safety reasons, let them out alone to cross the yard. Nor can they leave the rest of the class alone. Hail, rain or snow, young children must go to the toilet on cue using an outdoor toilet.

We need answers. While the Minister is new to the job, this is the Government's responsibility. If the contract is not signed by the end of June, the tendering process will have to start again. It will inevitably cost more. The children will have more than one more winter of queuing in all weather. They need a date when construction can start. Of all the billions of euro in the State's capital budget, surely two and a half million can be found so that children will not have to queue in the rain. Given this year's spend of €586.2 million, why can €2.5 million not be found for the worst national school in the country? I urge the Minister to find the money for Kilfinane national school.

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