Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for allowing this debate to proceed this evening.

In 1996, the Department of Education amalgamated two schools in my constituency in Ballinasloe, County Galway, to become Scoil Chroí Naofa. This was done with the understanding of the Department of Education that a new school building would be provided. That was 29 years ago.

There have been design teams appointed at several stages, planning permissions have been received and extended, and stage 2(b) submissions have been made - the latest submission to the Department is the third one to date. In 2016, the Department of Education informed the school's board of management that the new school would be going to construction that year, almost a decade ago. There has been false dawn after false dawn for this project and we are no further on. I met with the principal of the school earlier this year and at that point, the stage 2(b) submission was being prepared and was later submitted in March of this year. The latest update I have from the Department is that it is being reviewed.

There are currently 300 children enrolled in the school with a growing waiting list that cannot be touched without additional capacity being made available. The school is unique in that it has been designated a DEIS band 2 school and has been since the status commenced in 2006. The school has three special classes; two for children with developmental language delay and one for children with autism. There would and will be capacity for two autism classes in the new school building. We know, of course, about the demand for special classes and the number of children and families who are left seeking special classes all the time. It is no different in Ballinasloe, where this school's catchment area feeds into Counties Galway, Roscommon and Westmeath. It is a very large catchment area.

The school is located across two buildings on opposite sides of a very busy road. It is on Society Street with traffic coming in and out of Ballinasloe and is one of the main entrances and exits out of the county town. This is really dangerous. Frankly, it is incredible in this day and age that one school is spread across two locations across the road from each other on a very busy road. One building dates back to the 1930s while the second was built in the 1970s. It is a single block with no insulation and single-pane windows. Due to the school being in limbo for the past 20 plus years, it has limited itself in carrying out remedial works because the understanding was that the new school was coming.

Energy bills account for the entire capitation grant every single year. According to Pobal, the Ballinasloe urban area - which is spread across several areas - is categorised as extremely disadvantaged. This is a community and town that is long overdue a new school. The length of time this has gone on is totally unacceptable. I want to see movement on this as a local representative for the area. I want to see this project moved to tender and into construction.

Almost 30 years after the commitment and promise was first made, the Government should look to move on the stage 2(b) submission which has been with the Department since March. The school needs to know when this is happening and have some kind of timeline so it knows this new build is coming. It has gone on for far too long.

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