Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Before I raise the issue, I wish to ask who will be taking it.

Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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I am.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Which Department are you in?

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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We will not have a question and answer session now. With any Topical Issue, Deputies have a choice not to go ahead with it if the Minister is not here.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I wish to express my view and then I will make a decision whether I will or will not proceed. I am very disappointed. This is the third time I put down a Topical Issue debate and the senior Minister has not come in. People want to be elected to this House, and when they get elected, they want to become Ministers. When they become Ministers, it is like that thing we used to have in the newspaper, spot the ball. Now it is spot the Minister, because you cannot get a Minister into the Oireachtas anymore. This is their place to be, in Dáil Éireann, not wherever they are today. This is the third time the Minister for Education has refused to come into this House to answer queries that I raise. Here we are again today. There is no senior Minister here again. I see it when I am in the Chair myself. That they are not here is total disrespect for people who bring in motions. I will take this because it is such an important issue. If the senior Minister and no officials are here, I am sure this is only wasting my time. However, this is such a serious issue that I will raise it.

It is about Holy Trinity National School. It is based in a Church of Ireland school building that is more than 200 years old. The building was first deemed unfit for purpose by the Department of Education in 2010. It has been on the school building list since 2015 and due on site in 2018. The principal, Orla Brickenden, asked the Sisters of Mercy for an abandoned former school – the Scoil Phádraig site. The nuns agreed to give the site to Holy Trinity for a new school. The Department of Education took ownership of the site. Years passed. The Department and the local authority wrangled over who would take over the ownership, and eventually it was taken over. The Department of Education then attempted to put Holy Trinity National School and Education Together in the same site. That did not work. More years passed. In 2022, the Department wrote to Holy Trinity and acknowledged the frustration and significant concerns caused by the delays on this project. The Department undertook to do work to advance the project until the brief had been completed as expected by Holy Trinity. In October 2022, a design team at the cutting edge of advanced environmental school design was appointed. To be fair to the school, it played the game. It saved the blocks. It was going to be environmentally friendly and the Department was delighted with that. But then what happened? In March 2024, the Department announced that while the Holy Trinity school project was to process through the various stages, the Department intends to use the old building and has explained what it will do. It was going to spend a fortune of money putting another school in the old building because of overcrowding in the other school.

This is not fair on this Protestant school. Ministers go all over the world lecturing other countries about equality and everything else. We are trying to have it in this country. This is a small Protestant school that was promised its school building since 2015, yet here we are now. The Minister for Education and the Department of Education will now do up an old school, put another school into it for the short term, then knock it and rebuild an old school. What is going on in the Department of Education and what is it doing to this project and the school? It talks about everybody working together on this island. Well, it is not showing a very good example when this Protestant school is being treated like this in the town of Westport. I call on the Minister to immediately get some other place for the overcrowded school and start the build on Holy Trinity school.

Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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I am taking this on behalf of the Minister for Education. I thank the Deputy for raising the matter as it gives me, on behalf of the Minister for Education, the opportunity to provide an update to the House on the current position regarding the major school building project for Holy Trinity National School in Westport, County Mayo.

The major building project for Holy Trinity is to provide a new four-class primary school with one class special education needs base and involves the renovation and extension of an existing former school building. This would also provide a general purpose room, a library and resource area, a principal’s office, a general office and other ancillary accommodation. The project to which the Deputy referred has been devolved for delivery to Mayo, Sligo and Leitrim Education and Training Board and it appointed a design team to progress the project through the necessary architectural stages of design, statutory approvals, procurement and construction. As the Deputy may be aware, the project to develop the Minister-owned former Scoil Phádraig building at Altamount Street for Holy Trinity National School was approved at stage 1 following a recent stage meeting.

While Holy Trinity National School’s project progresses through its various stages, the Department has identified the former Scoil Phádraig building as a solution for urgent temporary accommodation needs for Sacred Heart School Westport. As the Deputy may be aware, a project to provide a new replacement school building for Sacred Heart School in Westport is planned. Modular accommodation has already been provided on the Sacred Heart School site to facilitate the vacation of the parts of the school that were in the poorest condition. However, the condition of the remaining accommodation is such that there is a requirement to vacate the majority of this to support a safe working environment for the staff and students in that school. The Department is following through on this requirement as a matter of urgency. After significant work to identify and consider all potential options, the use of the former Scoil Phádraig building was identified as the only viable solution to meet this urgent accommodation need in the timeline required.

The Department is conscious that the use of the former Scoil Phádraig building as an interim solution for Sacred Heart School has raised some concerns on the part of the Holy Trinity National School community. In that context, the Department has had productive engagement with the school’s patron, the Bishop of Tuam, Limerick and Killaloe. The Department officials have confirmed to the patron that there is a continued commitment to the delivery of the Holy Trinity National School project and set out some assurances and proposals of how the Department can support Holy Trinity National School in the interim as well as enhancing the overall outcome for the school in the medium term. As a first assurance, given the importance of the delivery of the Sacred Heart School project, which includes accommodation for Westport ETNS, for the affected school communities, including Holy Trinity National School, the project for Sacred Heart School has been slotted into one of the Department’s delivery programmes that has existing project management supports to support and facilitate project delivery. This approach will significantly aid the timeline for the Sacred Heart School project. The brief for the project has been finalised and it will commence stage 1 in the coming weeks. In effect, this means that the Sacred Heart School project is just one stage behind the Holy Trinity National School project.

The Department has invited all relevant patrons to join an oversight group that will monitor progress on the projects for Holy Trinity National School, Sacred Heart School and Westport ETNS. Given the inter-relationship between these projects, the Department will be making arrangements for the project manager and the design teams for both projects to liaise and work closely together to ensure both projects get progressed as quickly as possible through the various stages of design, tender and construction.

While the Sacred Heart School project is of significant scale, as part of good co-ordination between both projects, the Department is proposing a phased construction that would prioritise the finalisation and vacation of the Scoil Phádraig building.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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This has been going on since 2010. I will simplify it for the Minister of State, that he might bring it back to the Department. The first thing I will do today is write to the Comptroller and Auditor General about why taxpayers' money is going to be wasted.

The school has been abandoned in recent years but the Department is going to put taxpayers money into it now. Holy Trinity is the Protestant school, but if this was a Catholic school it would not happen. Because it is a small Protestant school the Department is taking advantage of the Protestant community in Westport. I call on the Minister today to abandon the idea and to find another place for the school in Westport that has a problem. It should start the new build on the Protestant school that has been ongoing since 2010. What is going on in the Department of Education is a scandal. I do not know how it could even think about doing this. How could it think about doing up an old building that has been abandoned for three years, spending taxpayers' money on it and then knocking it again and building a new school on it?

There is something wrong in the public service in this country at the moment. I am going to write to the Comptroller and Auditor General today to ask him to investigate how we could allow taxpayers' money to be wasted on a building that is condemned, one that will be knocked and rebuilt. The Department is now going to put money into it, knock it again, and build a new school. There is something very wrong - something rotten - in the Department of Education. It is wrong. I hear senior Ministers lecturing about what is going on in Israel. What is going on in Mayo is not right. It is not right what is being done to the Protestant community. I call on the Department of Education and the Government today to build the Protestant school in Westport. Let us have equality.

Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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I fully understand the frustration the Deputy feels on this matter but it is important to acknowledge – this is not from a script - that there are more than 1,500 projects being dealt with by the Department. While the interim works on the Scoil Phádraig building will serve as a first phase for the Holy Trinity National School project, the progression of the project for the remainder of the works will be managed in tandem with the Sacred Heart School project, to facilitate the commencement of the works upon the vacation of the building by the Sacred Heart School. Every effort is being made by the Department to fast-track the project. The Department set out that clearly in the reply.

The other issue that needs to be taken into account is the safe operation of the schools. The safe operation of schools - in this instance the Sacred Heart School - is of paramount importance to the Department. Nevertheless, the Minister wants to reiterate the Department’s commitment to the Holy Trinity National School project and getting it delivered as quickly as possible. The Minister thanks the Deputy for raising the issue. Every effort is being made to prioritise this project, but in the meantime the reason for the proposed approach is safety.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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If we have to wait for the school it will be ten years before the new school is built.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Deputy Ring should not interrupt.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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It is not right. It is discrimination against the Protestant school. I want to put that on the record.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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The Deputy should please not interrupt.

Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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I will come back to the Minister with the Deputy's concerns. As I said, I am stepping in for the Minister for Education and that is the information I have received. I will convey the Deputy's concerns to her.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I do not think they know what is going on in the Department. That is the problem.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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The Deputy should please not make any personal comments in regard to matters. Deputy Ring chose to go ahead with the Topical Issue. I understand his frustration but he chose to go ahead with it.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I beg the Leas-Cheann Comhairle's pardon.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Deputy Ring chose to go ahead with the Topical Issue today, so he cannot have it both ways.

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I am sorry. I cannot hear the Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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That is okay. Sometimes it is good not to hear.