Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)

I acknowledge the significant work that goes into any construction project. I acknowledge that, for a lot of principals in schools, this does not happen overnight. It takes many years of initial working with the Department to get that approval, identifying the design team, and going through the design stages and the various pieces of work that have to happen. Insofar as possible, the Department's objective is always to support the school. Where there is an ETB, a huge amount of work is often devolved to the ETBs, which identify the design teams. Where that is not the case, there is a structure within the buildings unit in the Department to help identify the design team, support the principal and board of management through the process and make sure as many projects as possible can be delivered.

There is always the need to work within the budget we have. While we have had significant investment taking place for the past number of years, there are 4,000 schools across the country and many of them are old and need upgrading. We also know that, while the population is decreasing in some areas, it is continuing to increase in others. We need to make sure we are still building new schools and creating more capacity. That is exactly what is happening in Cork, not just in primary and secondary, but also in the significant number of special schools that are being developed.

Insofar as possible, the Department endeavours to support principals, but we are open to any other proposals or suggestions as to how we can improve that working with schools.

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