Results 481-500 of 1,029,229 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Margaret Conlon OR speaker:Catherine Murphy)

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: It took 45 months from the appointment of a design team in March 2012 to complete the Temple Carrig School in County Wicklow. The school sought an extension and a design team was appointed in 2021 but the school is still at the first stage 37 months later. People at the school estimate it will take them six years from beginning to end to add an extension whereas it only took half that time...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Every application means there is a new school or extension needed. Please tell us more about that priority.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: We have a growing population so the Department must be ahead of things.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: I wish to come back to a couple issues, one of which is capacity in schools. The Department builds new schools. It knows the areas that are growing and have expanding populations, yet the schools being built do not have additional capacity. The upshot will be that prefabs will be required after a school is built because perhaps there is not another site available and it takes so long to...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Sorry, where is the forward planning when it is known that a school is fully subscribed and the Department is building a new school but not adding to the capacity even though the area is growing in population?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: There is no capacity for growth, however, even though the Department knows the areas are growing and have expanding populations. I refer to areas like Fingal, Kildare, Meath, south Dublin and Wicklow. It is not new that they are growing rather they have been growing and there has been a pattern of growth for decades now. Why would the Department not factor that in when looking at capacity?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: I will stop Mr. Loftus there. I know these things well. A site in Celbridge under the control of NAMA was identified in 2017. There is St. Raphael’s special school. These are the most vulnerable children. It is not a question of adding an extra classroom to an existing school, rather this is one-to-one care. The school is falling down around the staff and pupils. St....

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: I am sure it will be one of several examples, but in those situations, can the Department fast forward through the design processes?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: On the July or summer provision, the children of St. Raphael’s will not be able to go to summer camps. The application was made for July provision and it was refused because the minimum is two weeks and they could only provide a week. Surely something is better than nothing. It seems extraordinary that the Department states it is going after schools to try to get more schools...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: But the Department refused.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: I do accept it was for a month and I can understand why. How much of the increase in spending in 2022 on school buildings was due to the cost of inflation or to accelerated construction? Was it almost exclusively inflation?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Every year where I live there is a scrap for school places. Sometimes schools are asked to accommodate additional students and prefabs can be put in at fairly short notice for them. Presumably there is some budget for this every year. Will the witnesses give us an indication of this particular aspect where each year the Department must provide at a late stage for the accommodation of...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: It has been said that Wicklow and Kildare are in a red zone. What other counties are in this red zone?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Where are the flashpoints?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Can I ask a quick question?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: We know Caranua was a finite organisation and it has completed its work. There are, however, still a small number of outstanding clients. There is one particular gentleman in Limerick who had a builder walk out of the site and it has been a building site for the past few years. Are there others like that? When do the witnesses expect to have in place the legislation needed to wind Caranua...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Is that the only case?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Office of Minister for Education (16 May 2024)

Catherine Murphy: Okay.

Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Naval Service (16 May 2024)

Ruairi Ó Murchú: On the numbers, there were 1,094 personnel in 2019. That is now down to 722. A determination has not been made yet on how many more are required to reach llevel of ambition 2. I assume that figure will be made available fairly soon. Irish waters make up 12% of all EU waters and 75% of subsea cables in the northern hemisphere pass through or near Irish waters. To monitor, surveil and...

Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Naval Service (16 May 2024)

Micheál Martin: The Deputy made a number of points. There is no lack of capital investment in our navy either in Haulbowline, which has undergone significant infrastructural investment and will have more, or for the purchase of ships and so on. In respect of enhanced patrolling of the Irish Sea and surveillance, monitoring subsea cables in our exclusive economic zone is very important. We have seen what...