Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour)
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89. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to confirm if there are any proposals currently to provide a bilingual French/English primary school in North Dublin; if there would be any funding available to support such an initiative; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [50287/23]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I wish to confirm to the Deputy that my Department does not have any proposals to establish a bilingual French/English primary school in North Dublin.

For school planning purposes, my Department divides the country into 314 school planning areas and uses a Geographical Information System (or GIS) to anticipate school place demand. Information from a range of sources, including Child Benefit Data, school enrolment data and information on residential development activity is used for this purpose. In addition, Project Ireland 2040 population and housing targets inform the Department’s projections of school place requirements.

Having considered the projected requirements in each school planning area my Department then makes an assessment of the existing capacity and identifies any requirement for additional provision.

When it is decided that a new school is required to meet demographic needs in an area, my Department runs a separate patronage process to decide who will operate the school. It is open to all patron bodies and prospective patrons to apply for patronage of a new school under the patronage process. Parental preferences for each patron, together with the extent of diversity currently available in the area, are key to decisions in relation to the outcome of this process.

There is no mechanism for the establishment of a new, State-funded primary school outside of this process, though it is open to an entity to establish a fully privately-funded and operated education provider.