Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I assure the Deputy there is no slowdown. In fact, there will be more spent on the capital programme for schools this year than was the case last year and there will be provision for 20,000 additional places for pupils in 50 major projects that will be completed by the end of the year.

The position in respect of a small number of schools is that when the last batch was released in April, 38 projects were allowed to proceed to tender and this absorbed the funding capacity. The project relating to St. Mochta's was not ready to be proceeded with at that time. We are now monitoring resources to see can we release projects relating to additional schools. That is clearly my desire in respect of schools such as St. Mochta's. I recognise that St. Mochta's has a particularly difficult history in this regard, given that work on the project has been ongoing for some years and that a number of design teams had to be disbanded, etc. I assure Deputy Burton that there is absolutely no slowdown. I also assure her that I am looking, as every Minister does, to the forthcoming budget to provide additional resources in an area that is high priority.

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