Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. I can assure him that Laois County Council is very active with school applications and does everything to move them quickly, so I do not foresee problems in the planning process. I welcome that the Department has completed the acquisition of the site. That is very good news as it is often the problem in other areas. However, the reply is disappointing in that it is very similar to the reply in March, in that the project brief is now being finalised. The Minister said he would ask his Department. I want him to be a bit more assertive with his officials. We both know that unless things are moved on and given a political push, particularly from a Minister, that they do not happen very quickly. I plead with the Minister to ask his senior officials to become active on this, to move it on and complete the project brief. That cannot take much longer. It has been sitting there for some time and I say that with respect to the Minister, but it should be ready to be signed off on by now. According to the written answers I have followed on this, it is going on since last December. It should be moved on to the architectural planning stage.

From what the Minister said, I take it that money is not a problem which is excellent to hear. I am delighted. It is a very special case. I acknowledge that progress has been made with mainstream schools. During the noughties when there was loads of money, it was used to rent prefabs and we had them all over the place, but in the last six or seven years a lot of new schools have been built, which is good news, and County Laois has benefitted greatly. I ask the Minister to work with his officials and try to move the project on, to get some definite progress, to finalise the project brief and to sign off on it and move to the architectural planning process.

I assure the Minister that, when it comes to schools and vital infrastructure in Laois, the county council will not delay the planning process by one day.

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