Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Question 47: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of schools in each county which are entirely composed of prefabricated buildings; the reason his Department is reluctant to create a statistical profile of the school building infrastructure in order to ensure an efficient use of State resources; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [7930/09]

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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The information sought by the Deputy is not readily available. Following a survey of over 900 schools across the country my Department has set up a database giving details regarding their use of prefabricated accommodation. The information gathered does not specify whether the accommodation in individual schools is entirely made up of temporary buildings.

The Deputy will be aware that demand for additional accommodation in schools has risen significantly over the last number of years, with the appointment of 6,000 extra teachers in the primary sector alone since 2002. The overall policy goal is to ensure the highest standard of permanent accommodation for all schools. However, in the context of a rapidly increasing school population, the necessity to put additional accommodation in place in a short time frame, and competing pressure on the capital budget available to my Department, it is necessary to make use of temporary accommodation in order to meet accommodation needs in some circumstances.

It should be noted that the Department did undertake, as a pilot project, the development of an extensive inventory of building stock in County Kildare in 2002. While this proved useful, the costs associated with not only maintaining that single Inventory but also rolling it out nationwide would have been prohibitive. I want to assure the Deputy that my Department is not reluctant to expand the information it holds on the school building stock. A full inventory of the stock of school accommodation across the country would undoubtedly be a useful tool in order to assist in forecasting accommodation needs into the future as well as other decision making processed.

The Department's recently commissioned Geographical Information System (GIS) is being used to collate all relevant population and school enrolment data in order to identify future enrolment trends at both primary and post-primary levels from 2009 onwards. It is envisaged that the full inventory of school building stock, when developed, would form another important layer of data to be used within the GIS system for forward planning purposes. We are looking at ways of developing our information systems but progress will be limited by resources available both in the Planning and Building Unit and for further development of IT systems.