Paudie Coffey (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Question 166: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if a school (details supplied) that has been identified by the school authorities, the local authority and the Garda Síochána as urgently requiring external improvement works in the interest of road traffic and pedestrian safety will be considered in the new allocation of funds under the summer works scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11295/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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In general, individual school authorities are responsible, in the first instance, for ensuring the safety and welfare of children and others in their care, including traffic management measures. The issue of road safety measures outside the vested site areas of schools, such as road signage, traffic calming measures etc., is a matter, however, for the relevant Local Authority. Local Authorities have the power to decide on road safety measures outside schools and should ensure that measures are in place to protect the safety of local school children.

I can confirm that the school referred to by the Deputy applied for funding under the 2011 Summer Works Scheme for improvement works to the school entrance. A list of 453 successful schools was announced on 30 March 2011 and I regret that the application made by the school in question was not selected. A letter to this effect has issued to the school. Applications from schools for gas, mechanical and electrical works were prioritised for Summer Works funding this year. Unfortunately, due to the scale of demand for funding under the scheme, it was not possible to grant aid all applications and accordingly it has been necessary to prioritise some categories of works over others.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Question 167: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will detail the number of schools that have benefited from the summer works scheme in each year of its operation. [11302/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The Summer Works Scheme was introduced in 2004. The purpose of the Scheme is to devolve funding to individual school authorities to undertake small-scale building works which, ideally, can be carried out during the summer months or at other times that avoid disrupting the operation of the school. Under the terms of the Scheme, school authorities are empowered to manage these works with guidance from, and minimal interaction, with the Department.

Ten categories of works are eligible for funding under the Scheme. These include, Gas, Electrical, Mechanical, Projects to facilitate inclusion and access for special needs pupils, Toilet facilities, Roof works, Window projects, Curricular requirement projects, Structural improvements and External environment projects. Since its introduction in 2004, over €590m has been grant aided to schools under the Summer Works Scheme. A Scheme did not operate in 2008. The Scheme has allowed the completion of projects in over 6,000 primary and post primary schools as follows: 457 schools in 2004759 schools in 2005785 schools in 2006970 schools in 20071,026 schools in 20091,567 schools in 2010 453 schools in 2011.

In addition to the 2011 Summer Works Scheme, a further €30 Million has been made available this year under the Jobs Initiative to fund school building works in 374 primary and post-primary schools. These funds will allow schools to carry out small and medium scale building works such as special needs access, toilet facilities, roof works and window replacements.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Question 168: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the programmes which will be reduced as a result of his decision to switch €20 million from current funding to the summer works scheme. [11303/11]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Question 169: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will detail the efforts undertaken by him to discern the likely number of jobs which will result from the increased allocation of funding to the summer works scheme and the number of jobs impacted upon in other areas by his redirection of €20 million to the scheme. [11304/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 168 and 169 together.

An additional €40m worth of school projects will commence this summer under the Jobs Initiative, of which €30m will be spent this year. Some €20m of this has been reallocated by me from within my own Department's 2011 capital allocation for higher education and an additional €10m has been made available to the Department from the Exchequer. The funding was not switched from the current budget.

Progress has been slow on a number of higher education major capital works. Where a project slows down we would normally seek to speed up expenditure on other major projects or allocate funding to minor works or for higher education site purchases, where there are always a small number of acquisitions under consideration. However, given the importance of the jobs initiative I decided to transfer €20m from the higher education capital budget to the schools capital budget.

In relation to the calculation of the number of jobs generated, there is general agreement that school works are very labour intensive. Industry norms as recommended by the Construction Industry Council have been used to determine the number of jobs likely to be generated from the investment in question. The Council has suggested that there are 10 direct jobs and 2 indirect one for every €1m capital spend. I would estimate that this funding will create at least 2,400 direct and 480 indirect jobs in the economy for around 2 months per project.