David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the office of the Ceann Comhairle for allowing me to raise this issue and I am delighted my constituency colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Sherlock, is present because we have been working together on this issue for quite some time. I am sure the Minister of State will have some positive information to impart.

Carrigtwohill was a village and is now a town between Cork city and Midleton. Because of the Cork area strategic plan, CASP, and the opening of the rail link to east Cork a number of years ago, a lot of zoning was done in Carrigtwohill, the population of the town increased dramatically in recent years and there are plans to increase it even further. There are three schools in Carrigtwohill, two primary schools - a boys school and a girls school - and a secondary school, St. Aloysius' College, which is also a girls school. They are very successful schools but, at this stage, the two primary schools are chock-a-block with students. I believe there are close to 900 students between the two of them, although the Minister of State might have more up-to-date figures, and there are prefabs stacked on top of prefabs at the boys school. The Minister of State has visited these schools, as I have, and will know they are excellent schools.

A number of years ago, an agreement was made to amalgamate the two primary schools and build one new primary school. For some time, work has been ongoing to locate a site in order to build these new schools. I understand funding is in place and everything is ready to go, except a site is needed. This has been ongoing for a long time and it is now reaching a critical point in that the schools are really and truly at breaking point because there is no space left in which to put any more prefabs and the number of children is set to increase in the next year or two.

I know the Department and the Government have decided that a new school is going to be built. I also know there are plans to build a mixed second level school in Carrigtwohill, which is badly needed. A survey was carried out among parents and I believe it is to be an ETB school, in conjunction with the Bishop of Cloyne, which is fine and is what the majority of people wanted.

What is needed now is some action on the ground. I urge the Minister and the Department to redouble their efforts to acquire a site, get planning and have these schools built. Two schools are needed, a new primary school, which is an amalgamation of the two existing primary schools, and the new secondary school. My understanding is that when this new primary school with 24 classrooms is built, it will just about accommodate current numbers so, even as we speak, we may be looking for another primary school. Perhaps the existing buildings could be used for other educational purposes.

This is now more than urgent. A very welcome extension is underway at the CBS secondary school in Midleton, a project worth over €3 million, and that school is planned to increase to 1,000 students.

It is the same in St. Colman's Community College in Midleton, where another extension is planned, and other schools in east Cork. The big issue here is that east Cork is developing. Since the rail link was established, a lot of land has been zoned, many houses have been built, many young families have moved in and many children are coming on stream who need schools and education. A lot of work is ongoing there in east Cork but Carrigtwohill urgently needs attention and needs new buildings for the amalgamated primary schools and the secondary school. Having said that, we probably need another primary school to be planned for Carrigtwohill because even if a 24-room school is built now, it will be inadequate to cater for what is there as we speak let alone what is coming down the tracks, pardon the pun, in a little while.

I am very interested to hear what the Minister of State is going to say on this. He might give us an idea of what the timescale for construction of the schools is once tendering has been completed and how big this proposed secondary school might be when it goes ahead and the plans for that. Is the Minister of State confident that the timescale laid down with construction to start in 2014-15 will happen?

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