Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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110. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if the refurbishment works at the National Archives, Dublin are ongoing at present; when the refurbishment works will be completed; and the estimated cost of this project. [38258/21]

Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party)
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The National Archives Repository project will convert the warehouse at the back of the main Bishop Street building into a secure environmentally controlled repository complying with internationally accepted storage standards while providing an increase of two-thirds in the total storage capacity of the National Archives. Work has already been competed on the removal of archives from the warehouse of the National Archives as well as investigative works and other preparatory works. The project is overseen by the Office of Public Works.

In March, I was delighted to give approval to the Office of Public Works (OPW) to progress the project to contract stage. The total cost of the project is estimated by the OPW at circa. €24 million.

The OPW envisages a 16 month construction period for this project once they award the contract. Following completion of construction, the installation of the shelving would take up to a further 6 months. As the project has been delayed due to COVID-19, it is estimated that the project will now be completed in 2023.