Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Question 1183: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the amount which was spent on temporary school buildings for new schools in each of the past seven years; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [25181/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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In the last seven years my Department has spent €42.8 million on the rental of temporary school accommodation, mainly in primary schools, see following table for breakdown by year. However, the information is not readily available in the format requested by the Deputy as the financial records maintained for expenditure on temporary school accommodation is not separated into categories relating to new schools, existing schools and schools for special needs pupils.

In addition, over the last seven years my Department has spent €82.5 million on the purchase of prefabricated buildings in the primary and post-primary sectors, see following table for breakdown by year. This expenditure was for the supply and installation of prefabricated buildings including associated site works, and other costs such as for compliance with planning permission conditions, professional fees, connections for water, electricity and sewage and represents less than 5% of the total expenditure on school buildings, €1.6 billion, between 2000 and 2004.

The demand for additional accommodation in schools has risen significantly in recent years mainly due to the rapid expansion in teacher numbers, particularly in the area of special needs, the growth in the school-going population in rapidly developing areas and the demands to cater for diversity through the recognition of new gaelscoileanna and Educate Together schools.

The current focus within my Department is to empower schools to resolve their accommodation needs, wherever possible by way of permanent accommodation. In order to reduce the amount of temporary accommodation at primary level a new initiative was launched in 2003. The purpose of this initiative is to allow primary schools to undertake a permanent solution to their classroom accommodation needs and to achieve the best value for money. The feedback from the 20 schools in that pilot initiative was very positive and the initiative was expanded to 44 primary schools in 2004 and over 70 schools were invited to participate in this initiative in 2005.