Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Seery Kearney for giving me the opportunity to address this issue. I speak as someone who is not just a Minister of State in the Department but as a Deputy in a constituency where this was an issue a number of years ago, where the demographic projections of the Department did not match what was happening on the ground for various reasons. I believe the Department system has improved immensely since then. If the Senator has specific information on numbers, and if the teachers and principals of the primary schools have specific information which she believes the Department does not have, I ask her to send it in.

Over the past number of years, we have not had situations where children were without school places. It happened on a number of occasions, including twice or three times in my area, but that was a failure of planning. The system has become much more robust and it is better but I ask the Senator to send in whatever she has to the senior Minister and it will be reviewed.