Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

I thank the Senator for raising the matter of Wilson's hospital school, Multyfarnham, County Westmeath. The Senator will be aware that Mullingar has been identified as an area of rapid development and such areas get priority within the Department of Education and Science for our building programme. The building programmes this year comes to €540 million with €4.5 billion set out over the term of the national development plan. This year 1,500 schools building projects will be delivered.

The school planning section of the Department of Education and Science is looking at the future educational requirements of Mullingar and the wider area at primary and post primary level. Factors being considered include population growth, demographic trends, current and projected enrolments, recent and planned housing developments and the capacity of existing schools to meet the demand for places into the future. That examination will be completed shortly.

In regard to Wilson's hospital school an examination of the school's long-term projected enrolments is being carried out by staff in the school planning section of the Department. Once the long-term projected enrolment is established and agreed with the school the Department will draw up a schedule of overall accommodation for the proposed additional accommodation and it will then be possible to progress it further. It is important that the long-term projected enrolment is signed off with that school. I thank Senator O'Rourke for raising the matter.