Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy is aware, the OPW entered into a service level agreement with my Department to deliver these and a number of other schools nationally. The reason the expertise and capacity within the OPW for the delivery of buildings of this kind was exercised and used was because we wanted to ensure that all schools outlined in the five-year capital programme would be delivered within that five-year timeframe. The Minister and his officials in the building unit in Tullamore were innovative in bringing in the expertise, knowledge and capacity to deliver from the OPW to assist in this ambitious five-year building programme.

As regards the Edenderry issue, the OPW has submitted the outcome of that tender process to my Department. It is being actively considered currently by the Department. It is untrue, as the Deputy said, that the Department has turned its back on this community. It most certainly has not. The Department is actively engaging with the OPW and it is more than confident that the schools will be delivered to this community. It is acknowledged that the community badly needs this investment.

The delivery of the schools will happen, albeit not within the original timeframe envisaged, but certainly as soon as is physically possible.

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