Michael Cahill (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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312. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills for a detail progress report in respect of an extension that has been granted to a school in County Kerry (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [67029/25]

Michael Cahill (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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331. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to progress the long-awaited school extension to a school (details supplied) in County Kerry; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [67180/25]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 312 and 331 together.

The school referred to was approved to enter the Department’s pipeline of school buildings under the Additional School Accommodation (ASA) scheme for a project providing 2 Special Education Needs classrooms and 1 Special Education Tuition room. The project is devolved to the school authority for delivery.

As previously advised, the Stage 1 report was returned to my Department. Following a period of communication and clarification on the initial submission, a revised report was requested from the school and has since been received. This report remains under review from both a technical and cost perspective in line with the Public Spending Code. All projects, including this one, are subject to the required due diligence under the Department’s Infrastructure Guidelines. Once this review is complete, the Department will inform the school authority of the outcome.

All diary requests are considered by my Office in the Department. The team can be reached by the following email address and they can liaise with the school in question.

Since 2020, my department has invested over €6 billion in our schools throughout the country under the National Development Plan, involving the completion of over 1,300 school building projects. Government support for this investment, including by way of supplementary capital funding, has delivered real benefits for school communities. Supplementary capital funding of €210 million approved by Government has brought the total capital allocation for 2025 for my department to €1.6 billion.

In July the Government announced a capital allocation of €7.55 billion for the Department of Education and Youth for the period 2026-2030 under the National Development Plan. As part of this NDP allocation my department will place a strong emphasis on provision for children with special educational needs, with a particular focus on meeting annual school place needs. In relation to project roll-out for Large-Scale projects and Additional School Accommodation scheme projects, the approach will be to continue to maximise the capacity of the existing school estate as much as possible in the first instance and provide necessary additional capacity through targeted and prioritised project roll-out over the course of 2026 to 2030 period to meet the most urgent and prioritised needs.

My department is now preparing an NDP implementation plan which is due for publication later in the year. This plan will optimise outputs from the NDP allocations, with a strong focus on maximising existing school capacity, progressing priority projects where local capacity across schools in the area is insufficient, and ensuring delivery that is affordable, offers value for money, and meets functional needs.