Paul Bradford (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State and congratulate him on his appointment.

I wish, once again, to bring to the attention of the Oireachtas the position concerning the national schools at Rahan and Glenville, County Cork. Some months ago, I raised the matter of Rahan national school on the Adjournment. Rahan is a townland in the parish of Mallow. The school at Rahan has been a major success story in the context of the quality of teaching on offer and the attractiveness of sending one's children there. In one sense, however, it has become a victim of its own success and is experiencing major difficulties with regard to accommodation. As I reported to the House some months ago, in order to bring to the attention of the Minister and the Department the plight of the students and highlight the inadequacies relating to accommodation at the school, parents engaged in what might be described as an unofficial strike and withdrew their children from lessons.

Through local fund-raising and the efforts of the principal, the board of management and the community in general, a site has been made available in order that the Department might provide a new school at Rahan. In addition to being a townland, Rahan is a growing suburb and is an attractive location in which to live. As a result, there has been a major increase in the number of children attending the school there. The accommodation at the school is extremely outdated and a response is urgently required from the Minister and her Department.

The other school to which I wish to refer is that at Glenville. Senator Boyle is familiar with this school and was represented at a public meeting held there some weeks ago by Councillor Chris O'Leary of the Green Party. Councillor O'Leary was made aware of the deficiencies that exist in the context of accommodation at the school.

The most important point to take into account in respect of Glenville national school is the fact that in November 2006 the then Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Mary Hanafin, wrote to Members of the Oireachtas, particularly those from the party she represents, and stated that building projects relating to a number of schools, including that at Glenville, would proceed immediately. The local community, the principal and the board of management of the school were informed that planning for a new school would commence in the immediate future. This commitment was given in writing — I hope it was not an exercise in electioneering — and it indicated that the project to build a new school would proceed. As with Rahan, however, there have been no developments regarding the building of a new school at Glenville. There has not been any indication of progress.

Glenville is situated near Mallow and is a suburb of Cork city. The position as regards accommodation at the national school in Glenville has reached crisis levels. On Friday afternoon last, the parents, pupils and those associated with the school, in conjunction with their counterparts from Passage West on the outskirts of Cork, held a protest march to highlight their plight. The last thing parents and children want to be doing is protesting on the streets. What is required is a commitment to proceed with new school accommodation. Interim solutions such as prefabs are only for the short term.

During my first term in this House in 1987, my very first Adjournment matter related to Rahan national school. It is disappointing to raise the same subject 21 years later and — while we are all glad to be hearty and back here — one would wonder about priorities in capital expenditure and the direction we are taking in education.

I look forward to the Minister of State's response. I appreciate he is not the man in charge of the purse strings but I appeal to him on behalf of both of these rural national schools, which serve growing village-type urban communities. There is a definite need for additional accommodation and I request the Minister of State to ask the Minister for Education and Science — himself a Cork man who knows both of these areas very well — to give the schools fair attention and a response by way of capital investment. This would help parents, teachers and, most of all, pupils, who should be educated in the proper physical environment they deserve in the Ireland of 2008.