Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta as ucht an t-ábhar seo a ardú. I am happy to reply on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Education and Science, who, unfortunately, cannot be present.

Forgney national school has a staffing level of a principal and one mainstream assistant. The school's enrolment at 30 September 2008 was 26 pupils. The school authority has applied to the Department of Education and Science for capital funding for a new school building. In the context of this application, the local inspector has confirmed that the school is expected to maintain its current enrolment and staffing level. It is not, therefore, experiencing the rapid increase in enrolment that has occurred in other schools around the country.

The Department of Education and Science uses published prioritisation criteria for advancing large scale building projects. There are four band ratings under these criteria with band 1 being the highest and band 4 the lowest. Band ratings describe the type of works needed at a school and the urgency attaching to them. A band 2 rating has been assigned to the proposed building project for Forgney National School reflecting the fact that the standard of its existing accommodation is such that it needs to be replaced by a new building. The structural engineer's report recently filed in the Department of Education and Science by the school authority concurs with this, as expected.

Modernising facilities in our 3,200 primary and 750 post-primary schools is not an easy undertaking. The extent of the demand on the capital budget of the Department of Education and Science is enormous providing, as it does, accommodation for new communities together with accommodation for the unprecedented number of extra teachers this Government has put into the system. As well as this, much of the existing stock, like Forgney national school, must be modernised as a result of historic under-investment. This will not all be achieved overnight.

Thousands of building projects were carried out under the last national development plan, NDP, to provide new and modernised educational infrastructure and thousands more will be carried out under the new NDP. The commitment of this Government to ensuring that all children are educated in appropriate facilities to enable the implementation of a broad and balanced curriculum is evidenced by the scale of funding made available under both the former and current national development plans.

A record €656 million has been made available for the school building programme alone in 2009. This level of funding, at a time of great pressure on the public finances, is a sign of the very real commitment of this Government to investing in school infrastructure. This will not only enable the provision of school places where they are needed but it will also allow the Department of Education and Science to build on the enormous progress made in extending and modernising existing buildings.

The level of demand on the school building programme is such that not all projects can be carried out together. They will have to be carried out in a structured and coherent manner and this is the reasoning behind the Department's prioritisation criteria. The project for Forgney, as with all other building projects, will be consistent with this approach.

In the interim, it is open to the school authority to apply to the Department of Education and Science for funding to repair the existing school building if the board of management deems this necessary.

See this speech in context