Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

I thank the two Senators for raising this issue. I will take the opportunity to outline to the House the Government's strategy for capital investment in education projects as well as the current position on Laragh national school, Stradone, County Cavan.

At the outset, the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, wishes to clarify that modernising facilities in our existing building stock while fulfilling the need to respond to emerging needs in areas of rapid population growth is a significant challenge. The Government has shown a consistent determination to improve the condition of our school buildings and ensure the appropriate facilities are in place to enable the implementation of a broad and balanced curriculum. This Government has dramatically increased investment in the school building programme to almost €600 million this year. The completion in 2008 of 67 large-scale projects at primary level and 19 projects at post-primary level will benefit more than 18,000 students, and construction work on 150 devolved projects will provide an additional 8,000 permanent places in existing primary schools. The Senators will be aware also that the Minister announced in September a further tranche of 24 large-scale projects to progress to tender and construction. This year has seen also a particular emphasis on the delivery of additional school places in rapidly developing areas, with the construction of 26 new schools under the fast-track off-site construction programme.

This is an enormous programme of work by any standards and, while there will continue to be a focus on providing extra places in developing areas, the Department of Education and Science will also deliver improvements in the quality of existing primary and post-primary school accommodation throughout the country. The emphasis, however, will continue to be on new schools and extensions to provide additional school places in rapidly developing areas. The programme also will enable the purchase of sites to facilitate the smooth delivery of the school building programme, again with the focus being on site requirements in rapidly developing areas.

The project of particular concern for the Senators is Laragh national school. This is a co-educational school with an enrolment of 127 pupils as of 30 September 2007. Senator O'Reilly stated that the school had 130 pupils, and I will not argue with him. The current staff at the school consists of a principal, four mainstream assistants, and one permanent learning support and resource teacher. The school authority submitted an application to the Department for large-scale capital funding for an extension project. The long-term staffing figure, on which accommodation needs will be based, has been determined. It has been agreed that accommodation should be provided to cater for a long-term projected staffing of a principal and five mainstream assistants, with appropriate ancillary accommodation.

The proposed extension and refurbishment of Laragh national school has been assigned a band rating of 2.1 in accordance with the Department's published criteria for prioritising large-scale capital projects. The progression of all large-scale building projects, including this one, from initial design stage through to construction is dependent on the prioritisation of competing demands on the funding available under the Department's capital budget. This project will be considered on an ongoing basis in the context of the Department's multi-annual school building and modernisation programme.

The Department's capital allocation for next year will amount to €581 million. This will allow it to continue to invest significantly in primary and post-primary school buildings throughout the country, provide additional school places and continue its programme of modernising existing schools. Annual capital resources of this magnitude have allowed the Department to deliver more than 7,800 building projects under the previous national development plan alone, and we look forward to building on this unprecedented level of work with an allocation of €4.5 billion for school buildings under the current national development plan.

I thank the Senators once again for affording me the opportunity to outline to the House the current position on Laragh national school, Stradone, County Cavan.