Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The Minister's troubles at the beginning are in battalions, not in single spies. This is a big one. The structural safety assessments to be carried out on 30 schools built by Western Building Systems are important because the lives of the children who attend those schools are at stake. The seriousness of that should not be lost on this House. If the Minister were in opposition and speaking on education, he would tell Fianna Fáil that it started the problem by abolishing the rigorous independent control inspections carried out by local councils in 1990 and replacing them with a series of self-certifications. The legacy of the Galway tent and all the rest that goes with that tradition has proved to be a disaster. What now faces us is the urgent need to make sure that schools which house children are safe. I would like us to discuss how in the name of God this happened. Is competitive tendering at the root of the problem? What is supposed to be cheap and efficient ends up costing the State far more and could also end up costing lives.

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