I would like to welcome the Minister to the Adjournment debate at this somewhat unearthly hour. The fact is the Minister has been here on a number of occasions — I think this is the fourth occasion that I have had an Adjournment debate and the Minister has attended in person — and I would like to thank her for that.
The motion tonight is the need for the Minister for Education to keep St. Garvan's vocational school, Dublin 1, open until a new second level school for the children of the north inner city is constructed in Sean McDermott Street. I have particular interest in St. Garvan's school because it was the school where I did my first teaching. I did my higher diploma in St. Garvan's, and that is where I got my first educational experience. Obviously it is an area I am associated with.
On Monday, 25 June, the parents were asked by the school authorities to come to an urgent meeting — it was described as an important meeting — where the future of their school would be discussed. They were certainly very surprised and disappointed to learn that what was being discussed was not the future of the school but the end of the school. There was no future for the school; the school was to be closed, and to be closed down immediately. It would not be continuing in the autumn. I consider this a disgraceful way for the education authorities to do business — that they would not afford the parents the courtesy of giving them some prior indication that the school was due to close, and that it would not be phased out in an orderly basis as is common practice at second level establishments in relation to rationalisation throughout the country. This is an unsatisfactory way of dealing with the matter.
The school has provided a service for almost 50 years in the area. It was set up in the 1940s and provided an educational service of a vocational nature to boys from the vicinity, and at the same time a school was set up for girls in Parnell Square to provide the same type of service. It is an extremely important school because it is the only school that provides that particular type of service of vocational, manual and practical nature for youngsters in the area. If the vocational school was not there they would not be going to any second level education. The percentage of youngsters in the area who attain second level education is very low by comparison with the national average: it is in the region of 28 per cent which is less than half the percentage in the city as a whole. It is an important service, it is an essential service, it is serving working men and women and unemployed people in the area. In that immediate area there is a high unemployment ratio, in the region of 75 per cent.
The school has conformed to new developments and new courses. It is the only school in the area that provides the pilot scheme in the humanities. If this school is closed there will be no such scheme available in any neighbouring schools for youngsters who will have to find another school in the autumn. That is not very satisfactory. The danger is that without a similar type of vocational educational facilities and without the school in the locality, many youngsters will drop out altogether. It is providing the services for the flat complexes in the area and there is not another school that is providing this service in the immedate vicinity. Because of the nature of the decision, the manner in which it was made, the suddenness of it, the lack of preparation, information and consultation with parents, youngsters who are badly in need of a second level education, simply will not be able to avail of it.
There have been closures of other schools in the area. Secondary schools have been closed in somewhat similar circumstances where religious orders — without proper consultation — or the educational authorities have not enforced any proper rationalisation in terms of school closures or school replacements. I have seen the other school I have been teaching in, the Loreto College in North Great George's Street, close down as have the school in Gardiner Street, the school in Eccles Street and this year another secondary school in the inner city George's Hill, is due to close.
The inner city area is being devastated of second level educational facilities and nothing has replaced them. Perhaps the writing was to be on the wall in relation to St. Garvan's school in Denmark Street because a principal had not been appointed for over two years. The same is the case in relation to the girls' school in Parnell Square; no appointment has been made, but there was no indication given to the parents or to the pupils that there was any intention to close the school, and now they have been told that the closure will take place immediately without any interim phasing out period. What will happen? A situation developed over the years; the buildings which are over 200 years, are not suitable for a permanent school and the VEC addressed that problem. In 1973 the City of Dublin VEC asked the Department, and made an agreement with the Department, that replacement educational facilities would be established for Great Denmark Street and for Parnell Square. The Department agreed and asked the VEC to identify a site and in 1978 a site was identified in Waterford Street, the Sean McDermott Street area, and the site was purchased. In 1981 the decision was made to go ahead with the construction, with the intention that a replacement second level educational facility, a community college, would be built and in operation by 1985. That did not take place.
In 1987 in response to a question in the Dáil, the Minister said it would cost £3 million to construct the school and that in the context of the Programme for National Recovery there were such budgetary constraints on spending that the Government could not do it at that time. Nevertheless, the Department were committed to the building of a replacement school. It was disappointing in December 1989 when, in response to another parliamentary question, the Minister indicated that a much less positive approach towards the school had been adopted. She indicated what she felt was a decline in population in the area; she said there was a surplus of school accommodation there already and if the school was to be constructed, it would be on condition of the closure of not just Parnell Square and St. Garvan's in Denmark Street, but also the North Strand.
My response is that there are sufficient pupils for a replacement school as earmarked in the Seán McDermott Street area. The Minister has already indicated her decision to go ahead with the reconstruction of Marlborough Street school — there will be a permanent primary school available there for the future. The numbers in Marlborough Street have stabilised and are on the increase. Likewise, the pupils of the local feeder schools in Gardiner Street, Rutland Street and St. Mary's Place, have gone to Denmark Street and would go to an inner city community school.
At the present time, we have a different vision of the inner city. In the seventies and the eighties the perception of the inner city was that it was on the decline. People were leaving and going to the suburbs, and were being transferred out to housing in the suburbs. This has all changed. There is at last a future for the inner city. We have the development of the Custom House docks area. We have new designated areas in the inner city. We have a commitment by the Corporation to rehouse the tenants in Sheriff Street — there will be 350 units constructed in the locality. We have the commitment to get rid of the smog problem. Inner city living is desirable.
One of the biggest issues of all is the untapped number of youngsters who are not availing of second level education who could be persuaded to avail of it if there was a sufficiently attractive educational facility, such as a community school or community college, that would have courses and facilities both for youngsters and for adults. That is the type of school that was envisaged, one that was almost a home from home, one that would have a broad range of subjects and that would be designed to accommodate a very broad range of people, both youngsters and adults. That would cap a whole new group of young people who have not been getting education in the past. These young people are there but they are not being educated. In my view, the replacement school would be ideal to meet their needs.
This is an area of great disadvantage. It is an area where unemployment levels are extremely high. It is an area where there is a lot of public housing, poor quality health services, maintenance and very few facilities. A community school would provide not just formal education but it would be of immense value to the community.
In the context of our present situation, in 1987 I admit there were budgetary constraints, and we all contributed to getting the country back on the rails with the Programme for National Recovery, but now we do not have those same budgetary constraints. Education, which made a disproportionate sacrifice to get the debt back in line, is an area we should put extra funding and extra facilities. Having sought a new replacement school since 1973, this is the time for the Minister to make a commitment to get the funding under the 1991 budget whatever it would cost — it was £3 million in 1987 — and that she would give a commitment to a living city, to the people in the city, the people who will not otherwise be served by educational facilities, that he will sanction the construction of that long promised school, and that she will phase out St. Garvan's, and not close it down, until such time as the replacement facility is in place.
It was with a sense of déjá vu tonight that I was in the other House when we were discussing the closure of the Arigna Mines and the power station. What they were looking for was a phasing in period where the mines that had been open for over 100 years and which provided the life force for the community would not close until such time as alternative employment facilities were put in place. We are talking about an equally important matter here, we are talking about the education and the future lives and training of youngsters. We should retain St. Garvan's until such time as the replacement community school is constructed in Sean McDermott Street.
