Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister has made a quite shocking admission that some of these schools will not be fully remediated or investigated until 2020. That is extremely worrying and concerning. We are already behind the schedule that was indicated to me when I met informally with officials. A much quicker timetable was envisaged for the remediation. I certainly do not blame the Department for the damage that this company has caused, or has potentially caused, but the Department does have a responsibility that this is done, fixed and put right.

It is concerning that the design and build review is being held up. I am not sure what it has to do with the Western Building Systems litigation. The bottom line is the Department is designing and building schools under the system that allowed this to happen. A review was promised with the aim of preventing this in the future and months later, that review has not started yet. That must be of concern, particularly when we were discussing the pressures on the capital budget earlier. All the schools are looking to get jobs done and we want to make sure that when those jobs are done, they are done properly.

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