Jack Wall (Kildare South, Labour)
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I thank the Ceann Comhairle and the Minister of State, Deputy Haughey, for taking this Adjournment debate.

The daily e-mails and representations I currently receive about educational facilities in Kildare paint a sorry picture of crowded classrooms, poor prefabricated buildings, a lack of quality sanitary services and a lack of the most basic utilities any school needs to carry out its daily function. The pressure and stress on the wonderful teachers who have to teach in such substandard facilities is exacerbated by letters received from the Department, some stretching back over seven years, which offer hope for modern facilities and dates for new modern buildings. These letters now gather dust as the dates and promises contained within have come and gone and the facilities in these schools continue to disimprove, with no announcement from the Minister.

I am deeply concerned about safety issues, especially in regard to electrical installations in some schools. The Department does not appear to take any responsibility for this matter. When schools are on the building list funding is not provided for maintenance. Perhaps the Minister of State, Deputy Haughey, will bring this issue to the Minister's attention when he gets a chance.

I am informed that such a letter was sent to the national school at Caragh on 26 November 2006. Despite the fact that there is only one staff toilet for 35 to 40 staff members, that more than 65% of pupils are educated in largely sub-standard prefabs, many of which are leaking and contain holes, the new school, as promised in the Minister's letter of 18 months ago, has not gone ahead and the wait for pupils, teaching staff and parents continues. The national school at Nurney is also waiting final approval. An effort was made by the parents and local people to purchase a site for a new school through fundraising. The Minister's speeches are awaited with bated breath but unfortunately Nurney has not made the cut either.

The wonderful school of Scoil Bhríde Naofa in Athgarvan has operated for approximately 28 years in mainly prefabricated buildings. In spite of the fact that schools in the nearby town of Newbridge are almost at bursting point, the Minister did not use the recent announcement of capital funding to reduce the burden on the pupils and teaching staff of this school and on the greater community of the biggest town in my constituency. In this case land was zoned by the local authority but the owner of the land said it was not for sale. I believe the Department cannot compulsorily purchase land for educational needs. I do not understand the lack of progress or how this zoning could be made, especially given the urgent need in this area for a school and the fact that the existing school has no play area and only prefabricated buildings.

An unbelievable situation surrounds the Community College in Athy. The Taoiseach performed a sod-turning ceremony on this site seven years ago, yet despite the lack of adequate hot water, or a modern comprehensive heating system and the deplorable fact that there are only three toilet cubicles for 101 boys and four cubicles for 133 girls, the wait for the pupils and staff continues. Not alone is the education of the children in Athy and surrounding districts suffering but adult education is suffering also. Provision in this area, which is so popular and is vital to any community, has to be cut back due to a lack of facilities. Time and again we have been promised funding will be made available for this school but nothing has happened to date. Local people eagerly await each roll-out but have been sadly disappointed to date. Given the fact that the Taoiseach, who is now in the last days of his tenure, turned the sod on a new school seven years ago, I hope and pray the genuine intention was there to build a new school rather than to engage in a political ploy. Whatever the case, seven years later there has not been any advancement of the school.

At a time when the population of Kildare is at an all-time high, planning for educational facilities in the county appears to have been forgotten. Such facilities bring satisfaction and allow children who are the future Deputies and Ministers to receive their education in the comfort and security of which any modern country would be proud. The four schools to which I referred are unfortunately not the only ones in my constituency that experience problems currently. They are, however, among the worst cases I have come across and I urge the Minister immediately to address their concerns.

This is the most important time in the lives of the students of these four schools and it is up to the Minister to ensure they have happy memories rather than memories of cold prefabs where they and their teachers had to queue to use the toilet facilities each day. I could speak about other schools.

I welcome the impending visit of the Minister next week to open facilities at Kilmead and Athy. The general consensus is that Kildare has been forgotten in terms of funding for schools. I hope the new community college will be included in the next roll-out for the sake of the students but also of the adult population of Athy and its hinterland who are also suffering.

Seán Haughey (Dublin North Central, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy for raising these matters and giving me the opportunity to outline to the House the actions being taken by the Department of Education and Science to address the accommodation needs of the schools referred to in County Kildare. Under the national development plan, €4.5 billion has been assigned to the capital requirements of the primary and post-primary sectors. Almost €600 million will be spent this year on school buildings.

Regarding the schools referred to by the Deputy, Caragh national school and Athy community college are situated in locations — Naas and Athy — designated as developing areas in the school planning and building unit. As part of the programme for Government, a developing areas unit was established recently in the Department to focus on the school accommodation needs of such developing areas, with the main emphasis in 2008 centring on the provision of sufficient school places in these areas, as well as delivering improvements in the quality of existing primary and post-primary school accommodation.

Architectural planning of a new community college in Athy is at an advanced stage and a tender report has been received in my Department. This project will deliver a new 4,850 m2 school to cater for a projected enrolment of 400 pupils. Along with a wide range of general and specialist classrooms and associated administration-ancillary accommodation, a dedicated physical education hall and facility for students with autism are also included in the plans.

Caragh national school's building project is also at an advanced stage of architectural planning. An extension of 15 classrooms, a general purpose room and ancillary accommodation are planned. When the project is complete the school will have a total of 20 mainstream classrooms.

In the context of developing areas, the status of all schools in Naas and Athy is being assessed as part of an overall delivery plan for each centre and work on these plans is at an advanced stage. Delivery plans will be used to inform future programmes for construction in developing areas from 2009 onwards.

Scoil Bhríde national school in Athgarvan is at a very advanced stage of architectural planning. It is proposed to provide four additional classrooms plus ancillary accommodation to provide a ten classroom school. Nurney national school is also at a very advanced stage of architectural planning. It is proposed to demolish the existing school and replace it with a new eight classroom school.

The Deputy will appreciate that the progression of all large-scale building projects from initial design stage through to construction phase is considered on an ongoing basis in the context of the Department's multi-annual school building and modernisation programme, in which the main focus is to deliver school places within rapidly developing areas. He will also be aware that a school building programme for any year is rolled out in tranches to ensure the steady flow of projects to underpin the multi-annual nature of the school building and modernisation programme. The first tranche of the Department's capital programme for 2008 was announced last February. The Minister for Education and Science intends to make further announcements during this year regarding projects to progress in the context of the Department's building programme. I thank the Deputy again for raising these matters in this House.