Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)
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Question 155: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if her attention has been drawn to the fact that Educate Together can no longer assist groups of parents in certain parts of the country who wish to establish schools with a multi-denominational ethos due to the fact that they are not sufficiently funded; if she will increase the funding to Educate Together in order that they can continue to fulfil this function of assisting groups of parents to assert their Constitutional right; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [40129/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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A special once-off grant of €40,000 was paid to Educate Together in 2005 bringing their total grant in that year to over €81,000. In 2006 the funding provided to Educate Together was increased almost threefold to €120,000.

In making their case for funding to me Educate Together also raised the issue for support for newly establishing schools. To support such schools I introduced a new grant of €10,000 payable in two instalments of €5,000 for the Boards of Management of newly establishing schools in respect of training of the Boards of Management and staff of those schools in their initial years.

This grant is in addition to the existing start-up grant of €6,348.69 which has been available to all new primary schools, including Educate Together schools, which began operating from 1st September, 2000 onwards.

With regard to training of school boards of management generally, it is open to the School Management Bodies to apply to my Department for funding for this purpose.

My Department has supported the establishment of a significant number of new multi-denominational schools in recent years. Of the 34 new schools granted provisional recognition in the past four years alone, 14 are multi-denominational.

Many multi-denominational primary schools are established in areas of rapidly expanding population growth. School Building projects in these areas are assigned a Band 1 rating under the published prioritisation criteria for large scale building projects. This is the highest band rating possible which results in the delivery of permanent accommodation in the shortest timeframe achievable. Pending the delivery of new school buildings, the Department contributes 95% towards the cost of renting of temporary accommodation for schools with permanent recognition. The local contribution for a school in such circumstances is capped at €3,175 per annum.

To underpin the establishment of new schools, my Department has made a number of changes in recent years which have assisted patron bodies in the provision of accommodation. One of these changes, which was strongly welcomed by the patron body for multi-denominational schools, was the abolition of the local contribution to the building costs for state-owned school buildings, which had cost up to €63,000 per school. Other innovations include the development of the design and build model to provide permanent accommodation much faster.

Standard/generic designs have also been developed by the Building Unit of my Department for 8 and 16 classroom schools. It is expected that use of these designs, wherever possible, will yield substantial savings in terms of design team fees as well as reducing the time taken to bring new school projects to completion.

I am satisfied that the range of measures now in place, including the almost threefold increase in their grant, provides a comprehensive response to the request made for additional support for Educate Together and their schools.