Tom Sheahan (Kerry South, Fine Gael)

I welcome the common sense approach that was adopted by the Minister for Education and Science in his recent press release on prefabricated classrooms. The construction of permanent classrooms makes sense in terms of immediate and long-term planning. The Minister, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, said in the press release, which was issued on 19 October last, that he has "allowed schools to use grant aid for the purchase of prefabs to build permanent classrooms and if a prefab is needed for more than three years the department will offer a school a grant to buy it rather than to rent it". St. Oliver's national school in Ballycasheen, Killarney, is paying an annual fee of €81,000 to rent prefabricated classrooms. It has embarked on a programme of building permanent classrooms and will shortly complete a permanent extension. However, it continues to have to accommodate over 100 pupils in prefabricated units, which have been on site since the 2006-07 school year, at an annual rental cost of €81,000. As the enrolment of the school has grown from 410 in 2001 to 672 at present, the classroom space provided by the prefabs will continue to be required into the future.

The management of St. Oliver's national school would like to know how it can apply for additional funding to buy the prefabricated units, rather than having to continue spending €81,000 per annum to rent them. It would welcome the provision of further funds to enable the school to purchase the units, or build further permanent classrooms, and thereby cease paying rent. The construction of further permanent classrooms would represent a longer-term accommodation solution and stimulate employment in the local economy. Given that astronomical amounts of money are being wasted on prefabs in County Kerry and elsewhere in the country, I compliment the Minister, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe on his common sense and worthwhile endeavours in this regard. The Minister has chosen the right time to harness the changes in development and construction costs. I ask the Minister of State, Deputy Áine Brady, to state whether funding will be made available to St. Oliver's national school to enable it to buy the prefabs it is currently renting at a cost of €81,000 per annum. Perhaps she can clarify how the school authorities should go about acquiring them.

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