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

First, I should identify how the Department identifies areas that are undergoing significant demographic challenge.

It uses a combination of CSO data - the most recent census data - and data from the Department of Social Protection - children's allowance data - to generate a very accurate picture of what the demographic demand is now and what it will be in the next five to six years. Using that data, it has been concluded that Tramore, where the school is located, is not currently an area of significant demographic growth. That is hard verifiable data from the CSO and the Department of Social Protection, from which one is able to document every child living within a certain radius of that school.

The Department has a major challenge to face in terms of delivering school buildings over the next number of years and I am sure the Deputy is more than aware that enrolment in post-primary and primary schools is expected to grow by almost 70,000 by 2018 - more than 45,000 at primary level and 25,000 at post-primary level. That is a major challenge we face in terms of providing classroom space for those young people. The Minister has always expressed a fear that at some point we would arrive at a situation where children of school-going age would simply turn up at a school with no classroom space available for them.

Prefabricated classrooms are not the ideal environment for any school and we all wish we had the resources not to have to use prefabricated accommodation. However, for the moment, those young people in Tramore have a school and classrooms. They have quite a modern school environment, based on the fact that most of the investment was made over the past three or four years. As we say, when resources become available to us, we will be able to progress that project to a new school building at some point in the future.

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