Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

During the debate on the confidence motion this morning, we were told by several Government speakers about the strong population growth throughout the country. The problem is that one cannot have population growth without providing services in parallel. That is what continuously happens here. There are almost a 250,000 people living in County Kildare. It is the fourth most populated county, and has been so in the past three census. When people come into my constituency office to discuss the matter of school places, it comes as a complete shock that the Department of Education cannot count and cannot provide school places for children. Kilcock was referred to earlier. Some of the area around Kilcock is also located in Meath. There are two schools there. The child of one parent I talked to the other day is 18 out of 30 on the waiting list for one school. The position with the other school is the same, although there may be slightly fewer children on the waiting list. There are approximately 50 children in total on the waiting lists for two schools. We are being told - the Department gives these ridiculous replies - that there may be a duplication of applications, that it may be about school choice, that some towns have single-sex schools or that there may be external pressures. I will tell the Minister of State why it is happening. It is because there are not sufficient school places for children in the area. That is despite the fact that one could have predicted that those children would be living there. It is not good enough that we have this every year.

Kilcock is not the only place in which this is happening. We also have a Gaelcholáiste in Maynooth. There are six classes in the Gaelcholáiste. Where it is located? It is in rooms above a shopping centre. There is no window or natural light in the classroom. This school caters for two areas. There is no firm commitment on a date for a new school building.

In Celbridge, there are three schools for which the relevant project reached design stage but the Department of Education is dragging its heels. There is no space. One of the schools is a special school, St. Raphael's, for the most challenged children. St. Patrick's primary school has been in prefabs since its inception. They are nearly gone by their sell-by date. There is not another inch to put another prefab in Celbridge Community College. Where are those children supposed to go? When children in neighbouring areas cannot get into those schools, they have to get school buses, which are non-existent. We had one parent tell us in the past couple of weeks that the cost of getting their child a place will be €900. If there was a place available in the nearest school, the child could have free transport. That is the kind of thing we are seeing. One cannot grow the population without growing the facilities. We do not see that from the Department and we have the same problems every year.

See this speech in context