John Paul Phelan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

7 o’clock

The Minister, Deputy Bruton, sends his apologies that he cannot be present for this discussion. I am happy to replace him because this is a subject close to my heart. A few members of my extended family are in similar schools in County Kilkenny.

The Minister thanks the Deputy for raising this matter as it provides an opportunity to outline the current position of Holy Family special school, Cootehill. The school is a multi-denominational, coeducational special needs school that caters for pupils aged four to 18 years with moderate or profound learning difficulties and students with autism. This project is included in the six-year programme announced on 17 November 2015 to go to tender and construction. The original brief was to provide a 21-classroom school. Following a meeting with the Department of Education and Skills in December 2015, the school and its design team were authorised to increase the scale of the project to deliver a new 26-classroom school. On 18 November 2016 the design team submitted a stage 2a addendum report to the Department for review. The review was completed by the end of January 2017 and the board of management and its design team were authorised to complete stage 2b, the developed design stage. This stage includes obtaining planning permission, a fire safety certificate and a disability access certificate. All statutory approvals have now been secured for the project.

Construction will require moving the existing school to temporary accommodation on a nearby site. The move will be an integral part of the school building project and will form part of the main contract. Planning permission for moving accommodation was secured in August 2016. The fire certificate and disability access certificate were subsequently secured and the Department has authorised the signing of a lease by the school to secure the movement to the other site. The stage 2b detailed design report was recently submitted to the Department by the board of management and its design team. Following receipt of that submission, the Department authorised the board of management to instruct its design team to commence the pre-qualification process for the assessment of suitably qualified contractors to which the project can be tendered. This authorisation was granted by the Department in order to expedite the tender process for this project by running the pre-qualification in tandem with the finalisation of stage 2b. The design team has commenced this process and the closing date for the e-tenders advertisement was 19 June 2017. Following examination of the stage 2b report, some additional items have been requested by the Department, not just in terms of the order in which they were put in. Additional items were requested. A revised submission has recently been received by the Department. Upon review of the revised submission, the Department will revert to the board of management with regard to the further progression of the project at that time.

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