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Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 23 Apr 2008

Vol. 189 No. 7

Schools Building Projects: Motion.

I move:

That Seanad Éireann, noting:

the inordinate amount of parliamentary time consumed by a continuous stream of adjournment debates on school building projects and the consequent repetitive, uninformative and unhelpful responses of Ministers;

concerned at:

the lack of transparency of the school building project processes;

the lack of efficiency of the school building project management, and

the apparent ad hoc nature of decision making in relation to same;

calls on the Government:

to establish an open, fair and transparent procedure;

to publish the precise criteria and their weightings under which schools qualify for moneys or grant aid;

to publish the precise criteria and weightings under which the prioritisation of the schools building list is determined; and

to introduce a tracking procedure whereby a school's building project can be tracked through the stages of the process and through its place on priority lists;

and proposes:

that the Minister establish an internal and external quality audit of the school building procedures and publish the results;

that a value for money audit be carried out by the Comptroller and Auditor General;

that a stock inventory of Irish primary schools infrastructure, including the number of temporary and permanent buildings be carried out by the OPW;

that the Public Accounts Committee scrutinise the equality and fairness of the procedures for awarding school building grants; and

that future school building projects be advanced through the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Act 2006.

I welcome the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Hanafin, to the House. I thank her for coming here to listen to my words on this issue. The proposal I am making involves something slightly different from what we usually do during the school building process. I am calling on the Government to put in place a project management procedure that I can understand. There is a need to publish the precise criteria and weightings under which schools qualify for building projects. The Government should introduce a tracking procedure whereby projects can be tracked through the various stages of the process. I ask the Minister to establish an internal and external quality assurance audit of school building procedures and to publish the results. The Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General should be asked to carry out a value for money audit. A stock inventory of primary schools infrastructure, including the number of temporary and permanent buildings, should be carried out by the Office of Public Works or some other body. The Committee of Public Accounts should be required to scrutinise the equality and fairness of the procedures for awarding school building grants. Future schools building projects should be advanced — fast-tracked, where necessary — through the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Act 2006.

The Government amendment to my motion, which is interesting in its own way, has nothing to do with the motion. I do not have any particular problem with the content of the amendment. I would be happy to accept it as an addendum to my motion, or to add my motion as an addendum to the amendment, in line with the Minister's wishes. I emphasise that I am open minded and fair about this matter. I do not mind acknowledging the good work the Minister has done, but that is not the issue being debated here. I am not criticising the Government in my motion. If the Minister is happy to accept my motion as an amendment to her amendment, or to do things the other way around, I will be happy to act in such a manner. I am sure the Minister is willing to consider the various possibilities.

I do not intend to get involved in a detailed discussion of the individual projects which could be used to illustrate the kind of stuff with which I am dealing. While it is not my business to do so, I will mention some schools to put my argument in context. The Minister might know Blennerville national school in Tralee, County Kerry, as the school beside the windmill. I first raised the school's needs with the then Department of Education in 1996, long before the Minister was assigned to that Department. At that stage, the school was awaiting the appointment of a design team. That is still the case. I raised the problems at Drumclough national school, which is outside Listowel, County Kerry, on the Adjournment some time ago. It has been waiting since 2006 for a design team to be appointed. Rahan national school, which is near Mallow, County Cork, was in the news recently and is encountering difficulties all the time.

The gravity of this issue was particularly well illustrated on today's "Morning Ireland", when a principal teacher was interviewed about a problem that is developing with a school building project in north Cork. When it was put to him that the Department of Education and Science has said it will move ahead as soon as a design team is appointed, which sounds very logical, cogent and acceptable in normal terms, the principal read from a letter he received from the Minister in October 2006 stating that the next step, which was about to be taken at that stage, was the appointment of a design team. That is the difficulty. It is not a question of where we are going — it is a question of how we get there. What do the various steps mean? How can a school get from one step to another? I have studied the various stages which are outlined on the website of the Department of Education and Science. There is nothing wrong with stages. The difficulty is how one gets from one stage to another. I raise this issue tonight because I am concerned, as a public representative, that ordinary people are unable to get information about these matters from the Department.

While I do not tend to get involved in schools building projects, generally speaking, I have taken up a few cases in recent times. I have learned that public representatives are unable to access information. If I cannot give people a proper explanation of what is going on, there is surely a problem.

I will give an example of the difficulties I have encountered, without mentioning any names. When I rang the building section of the Department of Education and Science in Tullamore about a school, I spoke to a helpful lady who said she had been told she was not allowed to give information about the school in question. She told me I had to go through an office in the Minister's Department. I have the name of the person and the date written down. When I put down the telephone, I rang the office in the Minister's Department. I gave the details of the case to another named official and asked what would happen. The woman in question said she would try her best to get the information for me and would get back to me. When I rang back the next day to ask if I could be given the name of the person who said public representatives could not be given information, I was told I could not be given that information either. I was put on hold for a while before being told I had to ring another office in the Minister's Department. I was trying, as a public representative, to get information in all fairness and honesty.

Apparently, the theory that has developed is that information should not be given to Deputies and Senators. I do not mind if that is the case as long as adequate information is given to stakeholders, but that is not happening. The problems I was encountering in the case in question continued to the stage that someone in the Minister's Department suggested to someone in my office that if I was so concerned about the matter, I should stick it down as an Adjournment matter. To say that I was furious would be to put it mildly. Not only was it an unfair and incorrect way to deal with things, but it also demonstrated that there are no proper internal line management controls in the Department. It is a total waste of parliamentary time to raise each case in the House. We should not have to do our business in such a manner.

When I decided to examine where the Government stands on these issues, I found that an "organisational review programme" has been established by the Department of the Taoiseach. The programme involves a new way of managing the delivery of customer service at departmental level, an examination of the question of governance at departmental level and an evaluation of performance measurement and customer and stakeholder feedback. Is a similar approach being taken in the building section of the Department of Education and Science? Is there a system of customer feedback on performance in the Department? When I visited the Department's website, I learned that it has a change management unit and that a customer action programme was in operation between 2004 and 2007. The plan sets estimated response times for customers, stakeholders and clients who have queries. It sets out the Department's commitment to informing customers of the standards they should expect at the point of service. Under the plan, stakeholders should be given an idea of the standards of service they should receive and the estimated time it should take to process applications for main services.

That is what the Department of Education and Science says it should be doing. The Minister, Deputy Hanafin, should take responsibility for it. I am not trying to initiate a personal attack on her. I am absolutely agitated about this issue. The way things are being done is wrong — it should not be like that. If the Department lived up to the standards it has set, I would not be wasting the House's time tonight. The Department's stated intention is to monitor its achievement in meeting its targets and to review progress regularly. It aims to set standard response times to be achieved by its school building service and to inform its customers of such standards, but that is not happening. I would be happy if the Minister were to tell me that such standards are to be achieved, and if public representatives could find information on behalf of school authorities or tell such authorities where information can be accessed.

I do not know what level of governance we have in terms of internal audit and quality assurance systems. I want to have in place what almost every other public body has, namely, a quality assurance scheme where an internal and external auditor take a number of projects, in this case schools building projects, follow them through from start to finish and check whether they follow established and agreed procedures and timelines. In terms of how an internal audit review should be carried out, these procedures and timelines would be written on the website of the Department of Finance. The audit review should examine whether these are followed step by step, where a project goes wrong and value for money issues. This governance is not in place.

Several years ago when the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission was created, it had to establish an internal audit function and a method of calculating a response time to customers and examine how it dealt with the public. It also had to report on each of these and establish a risk factor.

An inventory should be established. I have followed recent discussions in the other House and elsewhere. It was interesting to listen to the discussion at the meeting last week of the Committee of Public Accounts. I do not have time to go into all of it but it began with a simple question many of us have asked, namely, how many prefabs we have in primary education. We do not know, and it not only a matter of not being able to get the information from the Department as the appalling thing is that the Department itself does not have the figure.

From my involvement in audit functions in various organisations I cannot understand how auditors can sign off on the assets of a Department without knowing what those assets are. I do not know how this is done and it raises a query. I am following up on this. I have been in contact with the Comptroller and Auditor General because I want to find out how this can happen. When thanking the people from the Department and the Comptroller and Auditor General for coming before the committee, the Chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts stated:

I hope that when the witnesses return before the committee next year, some progress will have been made on carrying out the inventory. I consider it to be a major failure on the Department's part not to have carried out such an inventory in light of all the comments that have been made for the past ten or 15 years. It is incomprehensible to think the Department is planning for the future without knowing what it has ... However, this must be done in the public interest and progress should have been made by the time the witnesses appear before the committee next year.

When the Secretary General of the Department tried to soften it down, the Chairman stated:

No, I made my remarks in the context of one of the issues we discussed today, namely, the use of prefabs, whether they are owned or rented, their quality, their age, how many pupils are condemned to prefabs and over what period of time ... I refer to basic information that will allow the Department to carry out proper planning.

The Chairman did not put a tooth in it. The Committee of Public Accounts was established to investigate these matters.

I do not know whether a quality assurance programme is in place. This discussion is a marvellous opportunity. In a political context, it is quite in order for people on this side of the House to argue with people on the other side about a Government decision. It is equally in order for people on the Government side to state they cannot take action because they do not have the money. This is the normal political process.

The difficulty is that I cannot explain to people why they are in the position in which they are. If the Minister were able to tell me the Department of Finance will give the Department of Education and Science so many hundred million euro this year, this is our programme, this is what we intend to do and we will keep a certain amount aside because we know we must prioritise certain people, I would understand it and defend it as I defended schedules of appointments on which I had to shake hands, write in stone and sign in blood. We will live with these. We might not like them but there is an understanding.

What is happening here is that we are creating a major political structure of some description. We all write letters to the Minister and local TDs and letters go over and back. This morning on "Morning Ireland" a Minister was quoted as stating the Department could not give him information on the particular school in Cork they were discussing. I am not interested in the individual school. I am interested in the lack of information. Something must be done. I want the Minister to tell me what she can do about the issues of internal audit, quality assurance, organisational reviews, governance structures and how we develop and implement policy in this area.

I second the motion and I thank Senator O'Toole for tabling it in the name of the Independent Senators. He has put his finger on a serious problem. While we pay lip-service to education, I see real dangers and a similarity between the state of Irish education and the state of the Irish economy when the Celtic tiger started taking off. What we seem to have had in 1993 was a tremendous boom in the underlying and operating economy but no infrastructure to shelter it. We saw the lack of roads, airports and infrastructure of all types and we have suffered as a result.

Today, we have a great commitment to the burgeoning number of pupils in primary education and an infrastructure which seems to be in chaos. This will not be a disaster but it will have serious consequences for the future of the economy, those pupils and all stakeholders in education. What Senator O'Toole is doing is firing a warning shot over those politicians who state we have a tremendous commitment to education, as the Government amendment to the motion states. It boasts of the amount of money invested by the Government but it fails to address any specific problems.

I do not apologise for the fact that I am one of those politicians who has, from time to time, lobbied for particular schools. I have raised such matters on the Adjournment. Senator O'Toole is correct to state the replies one receives from Ministers on such issues are almost insulting. They are insulting not only because one is provided with a piece of flabby material which tells one nothing but they also reveal that the Department of Education and Science does not know very much, the Minister replying does not know much and somewhere in the queue rests the school one is representing but neither the Minister nor anyone else knows where it stands.

If some of the proposals in this motion were put into effect we would have at least a certain transparency so people could go onto the Internet, see where they stand in the queue, know what their expectations are and what commitment is made. At present, the replies we receive are inadequate and leave many schools, teachers and pupils in a state of uncertainty. Not only does it give rise to great frustration, it also gives rise to the suspicion that politicians can jump queues in this area.

The lack of information breeds uncertainty which we, as politicians, inflame and encourage to a certain extent by responding to public opinion by agreeing to try to obtain information about where a school is in a queue. When the Minister cannot tell them the answer people feel something is going on behind the scenes because we have no transparency. It would be helpful if the Minister announced that the website will contain information on where every schools building project stands, what its expectation is and when it will be finished. People would not need politicians to find out for them.

As the motion states, we could also have weightings as to who gets priority and why, which schools building projects are considered vital, less important or placed down the queue for reasons such as other schools in the area or not as much demand existing. We do not know which projects gets priority or how funding is allocated. It is very important for teachers and pupils that this done. There is a tracking system in certain states in the US, which works quite well. People can access the education website and find out exactly where they stand.

I appreciate the clause in the motion which states we should have fast track planning. It is inexcusable that some schools are unable to proceed with vital building projects for reasons of which they are unaware and because of trivial delays in the planning process. The result of that is what Senator O'Toole pointed out, namely, a type of prefab education system which will badly affect the morale of teachers, pupils and parents and will affect educational standards.

This issue is not unrelated to that of class size, which is often raised here. We are concerned with space and if space is not provided for schools, it is obvious there will be no space for pupils, class sizes will remain large and teachers will be working in cramped conditions once again.

I appeal to the Minister to respond to this motion, not in the usual way as in the amendment to the motion boasting about what the Government has done, but in a positive way with specifics telling us she will produce an inventory, provide information, introduce transparency in order that we know the way schools are prioritised, lift the morale of teachers, pupils and parents by giving more information and not cloak this issue in secrecy which makes people suspicious about how decisions are made.

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all words after "Seanad Éireann" and substitute the following:

acknowledges that

under the National Development Plan 2000-2006, funding of €2.6 billion delivered more than 7,800 school building projects;

€4.5 billion is to be invested in the school building and modernisation programme under the current NDP;

all applications for large scale school building and modernisation projects are assessed in accordance with the published prioritisation criteria implemented following consultation with the education partners;

innovations have been introduced in the design and management processes for school building projects to improve value for money;

the use of energy efficient designs has ensured that modern day schools are typically using three times less energy than schools built ten years ago and also using less than half the energy than what is termed as good international practice for schools;

the Department of Education and Science and the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government are working together to improve future planning for schools; and

the Developing Areas and Forward Planning units in the Department of Education are proactively planning for future school accommodation needs and are sourcing a Geographic Information System to assist with determining the location and planning of school accommodation;

and calls on the Government to

continue to both meet the need for new schools and extensions in developing areas and fund refurbishment of existing schools all over the country;

ensure that significant new residential developments are not approved by local authorities without proper provision for additional school places as required;

continue to improve the information systems used by the building unit of the Department of Education and Science; and

prioritise further value for money improvements.

Senator Ross said he does not like the Government amendment and that we are boasting about what we are doing. The amendment does not boast but gives the facts on what is being done. On many occasions listening to Members, one would think the door had closed in the Department of Education and Science and nothing was being done. Given that €4.5 billion is to be invested in the school modernisation and building programme under the current NDP, investment has far from stopped.

On "Morning Ireland" this morning I heard about a school in need of a new building. I do not know the individual case but what I took from the piece was that a new school was needed because three resource teachers were coming in to teach but there was only a spare toilet in which to teach pupils. The main part of our problem is that we are resourcing schools better than we have done in the past, although more resources are always needed. If extra people were not coming into the schools, would we need the building programme?

In many respects, it is very hard to gauge what a school's needs will be. In my constituency, there was a terrible row about a particular school which needed two extra classrooms. There were protests, the school was closed and much political pressure was applied. Given the political pressure, the school got the two extra classrooms, although whether that would happen under the current regime is another question. The school now has two empty classrooms because the population in the area decreased rapidly. There was no collaboration with the local council, for which our amendment provides. Those involved should work with the council to anticipate the needs of an area, for example, to ensure the council is encouraged to locate new housing developments in areas where there are schools to sustain the population, especially in rural areas. In the case to which I referred, the council was not locating new housing developments, with the result that the opposite of what I know Senator Healy-Eames will speak of happened, that is, the influx of——

Many areas are victims——

The involvement of councils in the process is very new.

----of many new people moving to them.

Each case does not fall into the same category and each school should have a priority rating. We have the banding system of bands 1 to 4. While everybody believes their school is a priority, it is important that there be criteria in place. The criteria regarding band 1 refers to the needs of schools in rapidly developing areas, the provision of specialist accommodation for special needs pupils, schools which are structurally unsound and rationalisation projects. However, it is not perfect.

When the Minister was first appointed I raised the case of a school with her. It had not been prioritised by the Department so I am sure she thought it was not a genuine case. Political pressure was applied only to ask the Minister to look at the case and establish whether it was a band 1 type of school. When she visited the school, she realised that one would need a heavy overcoat to go to the boys' toilet and a mask to stay in it for any length of time. The mould growing in most of the classrooms was unseen in this day and age. Those in officialdom and politicians could not understand how the school had slipped through the system.

The system should prioritise schools which most need support. Through the devolved grant, the Minister has enabled many projects to proceed in an innovative way. I suggest that it is tracked like the sports capital grants and the child care grants. People are often given money to draw down and most do so in a very efficient fashion but it is important the Department applies a certain amount of pressure to ascertain the status of a project to ensure those following from behind are able to move as fast as possible.

Value for money is important. The initiative to look at models of schools where considerable sums of money are not spent on architects' fees is very important. The green energy initiative is also very important and I encourage the Minister to continue to work with the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources to open up the national grid in order that schools can engage not only in green flag activities, such as reducing the number of plastic bags used, but that they can use energy generated by wind turbine.

It is impossible to say in the time available all that needs to be said. I believe schools are now getting involved in activities they were previously unable to get involved in and this is putting pressure on the building programme. The economy has been such that many people who left Ireland have returned to raise their children and avail of our good education system. The recently published OECD report ranks Ireland high in respect of competitiveness in terms of its outcomes.

We are, in some respects, victims of our success. I agree we should ensure continued investment in education. The return of the summer works programme is important. In this regard, small amounts of funding were invested in useful projects. I agree with Senator Ross that planning issues often can get in the way of developing schools. Schools often simply cannot get sites. These are issues with which the Minister or Department cannot deal even if they prioritise a school. There must be a certain amount of development at local level to ensure that when schools are prioritised they can proceed and draw down funding.

I welcome the Minister to the House. I support the motion tabled by the Independent Senators. It is well constructed and offers good guidance to the Department of Education and Science.

I have known for some time that the schools building programme is not working adequately. I accept the Minister has invested and continues to invest money in schools. Clearly, based on population needs and in other respects, as identified by Senator Keaveney, it is not working.

I did not say it was not working.

It is failing communities, teachers and pupils. I want to use this opportunity to provide the Minister with evidence the schools building programme is not working. It is in many ways a national disaster. I also want to be helpful by proposing some solutions which I ask the Minister, in her privileged role, to consider.

It became evident during last week's meeting of the Committee of Public Accounts that the Department of Education and Science and the Government has no detailed view of the school network for which it is responsible. It does not know how many rented prefabs are in use, what equipment is in place or the size of school sites. The officials admitted the Department has no database showing the specific details of schools already in existence. The Department's Secretary General, Brigid McManus, said it would be highly desirable to be able to quote from such an inventory.

How can we adequately plan without this essential baseline data? It is obvious the Department is not aware of its stock in hand. This is a major embarrassment for the Minister and her Department. Like other speakers, I would like genuine answers to questions about what steps the Minister is taking to address this problem. I propose that the Department immediately conduct a stocktaking exercise by way of a well-constructed, one-page survey of all school buildings, including prefabs and land.

In preparation for this debate I made a series of calls to schools throughout the country. The schools building programme is too slow and is failing to meet current teaching and learning needs. The most damning comment I can make is that the Minister and the Government are fooling the public and the children of the nation in that no one is measuring how the lack of an appropriate educational and learning space is impacting on educational achievement. This is a major factor.

There are several hundred building programmes.

As a teaching practice supervisor some years ago in Briarhill national school, Galway, a child could not pass by me to go to the toilet without knocking my folder off my knee. The pupils had no space to move. It was impossible to implement discovery active methods of a revised curriculum. Those pupils and teachers are now located in a business unit in Briarhill business park while their new school is being built.

A school is being constructed.

Why are they in these conditions?

That is because their new school is being constructed.

The Minister failed to plan forward and anticipate their needs when the old building was condemned.

That is a big condemnation of the Minister.

Senator Healy Eames without interruption, please.

The building programme is not meeting schools' needs; it is failing. For example, Moycullen national school, County Galway, has been on the schools building programme list for 11 years. Its representatives are unhappy with the Department of Education and Science building programme. When I asked them how the system could be improved they replied that applications for schools waiting more than three years should be prioritised. That is a reasonable request.

Newcastle national school, Athenry, has been on the list for almost 12 years. It cannot get any details on its position on the list. The school is bulging at the seams and believes it is being ignored. One of the school's resource teachers has to teach in the staff room, a hut used also by the principal and another resource teacher. The hut leaks and the heating fluctuates with the weather. The school's secretary must work from home. This is Government under Fianna Fáil in 2008.

At least the school has a secretary.

More than 50% of accommodation at Athenry national school is prefabs, some of which are 20 years old. This school is supposed to be at the top of the list in County Galway but they do not know what this means. Does the Minister know what it means?

Scoil Mhuire, Oranmore, a lovely school, is doing fine work. However, the teachers' desks are located in the corridors owing to a lack of space in the classrooms. The school is overflowing. The Minister will be aware of Doughiska which has a population of 8,000 and no school. The children from this area are attending surrounding schools which are overflowing and cannot cope with the pressure. They believe there should be more forward planning.

Blennerville national school, Tralee, referred to by my colleague, Senator O'Toole, has been condemned for some time following a health and safety audit. Each child is due 15 sq. ft. of space. Children at this school have only 7 or 8 sq. ft. of space. This legislation will only be enforced in respect of new school buildings. Like many other schools, staff at this school believe they were duped by pre-election promises when brought to Tullamore and given letters of commitment. The same applies in respect of St. Mary's and St. Gerard's national schools, Enniskerry.

Gaelscoileanna in particular are in bad shape building-wise. Gaelscoil Dara in Galway city has existed in prefabs for the past 26 years and has only recently acquired its first site. Gaelscoil de hÍde, Oranmore, of which I am intimately aware having considered sending my children there, opened in 1994, received permanent status in 1998 and still is in negotiations in respect of a site in 2008. This school, which has 200 children, was classified last year as a band 1 school. Some €750,000 of taxpayers' money has been spent on prefabs for Gaelscoil de hÍde. That is very damning. It is outrageous that 200 children must attend a school located on only a half acre site. Lunch breaks must be staggered to ensure the children can play safely in the yard. Current rent for the school is €125,000 per annum. How much of a mortgage would that amount have serviced?

The Senator has one minute remaining.

At a meeting last week of the Joint Committee on Education and Science, Mr. Dónal Ó Conaill, representing gaelscoileanna, listed seven schools that receive from the Department between €45,000 and €186,000 per annum for rent. This is taxpayers' money. An average of €120,000 per annum is spent on prefabs.

While the Government speaks of accountability and transparency, these schools have no notion of their position on the schools building list. When they do find out, it matters little as commitments are not met. I ask that the Minister when responding clarify delivery time for a band 1 and band 2 school. The Government must set aside annual funding for school buildings. While I acknowledge there is investment in this area, it is not enough.

I propose that the Minister examine a new development in school buildings, namely, the construction of modular buildings as a means of filling the urgent need for decent schools.

The Senator's time has elapsed. I must call the next speaker.

I spoke this morning with the principal of Oakhill national school, Leopardstown, of which the Minister is aware. This school was built and privately funded by the Legionaries of Christ order. It is a modular school which comprises ten classrooms. It comes in a kit and was built in eight months at a cost of €2.9 million. The lifespan of this school is 30 years. I have been invited to visit the school which I think the Minister may have seen already. The cost of constructing a permanent structure similar to this would be €8 million to €10 million. I believe that based on the growing needs——

The Senator has gone over her time. I call the Minister.

——the growing population needs, we need to look at other measures.

Go raibh maith agat. Ba mhaith liomsa mo bhuíochas a ghabháil leis na Seanadóirí. The one thing that is clear is that all of us are genuinely interested in ensuring that our schoolchildren get their education in the best possible quality accommodation. At the same time I know there are a number of schools that are waiting for their building projects to progress. I am very conscious of the fact that this can lead to frustration for the children themselves, for the parents, the teachers, and for public representatives. I know the Senators are aware that there are 4,000 schools in the country and the majority of these had no capital investment whatsoever in the decades before this Government came to office. As a direct consequence a considerable backlog of modernisation and refurbishment works must be undertaken.

At the same time, rising enrolments at primary level, populations shifts and significant increases in teacher numbers have necessitated the construction of new schools and extensions throughout the country. Many of the schools that we hear about are looking for additional classrooms because we supplied additional teachers, reduced the class size by two points and because we ensured that every school in the country had access to resource teachers. In the course of consultations with the Irish National Teachers Organisation about reducing the class size it was agreed that teachers would get involved in team teaching. I have yet to go to a school where two mainstream classroom teachers will work together within the one room, yet the teachers are seeking extra space and extra rooms. It has not been possible to meet all the demands and requirements while at the same time ensuring——

They need training for team teaching.

——that we are meeting——

They need time for training.

Let us hear the Minister without interruptions, please.

——the needs of the new areas.

The challenge before the Government, therefore, in addressing the historical legacy of under investment in school buildings and in meeting the needs of developing areas has been a significant one. Major progress has been made and continues to be made over a relatively short period of time. During the period of the National Development Plan 2000-2006, the Government accelerated the school building programme with record levels of investment and the streamlining of delivery systems. Over €2.6 billion was invested in more than 7,800 building projects. Last year, in the first year of the new NDP, 1,500 more projects were completed, ranging from small scale works, such as new roofs and windows, up to extensions and entirely new schools. With this scale of activity underway in recent years, virtually every school has benefited from at least one building project. The National Development Plan 2007-2013 sets out an investment of over €4.5 billion in school buildings to ensure that further progress can be made in coming years.

This year, €586 million will be spent on school buildings. The progress of any individual school in the building programme is conditional on the amount of money available. It would be very easy to assure teachers in these schools that the works needed will be done this year. If I had billions of euro to spend this year it could be done but I do not have such money. I have €586 million, which is a substantial amount of money but within that we must prioritise. What will happen with that money?

This year it will enable the completion of work on 67 large-scale primary school projects that will deliver 7,000 additional permanent school places in new schools and 2,300 additional permanent school places in existing schools. It will also fund construction work on more than 150 devolved projects under the permanent accommodation scheme, which will provide 8,000 additional places in existing primary schools. In the post-primary sector, construction work will be completed on 19 large scale-projects which will provide 2,400 permanent school places in four new schools and additional accommodation and refurbishment works in 15 schools that will benefit over 7,000 pupils.

The direct post-primary capital allocation of €196 million will be boosted by the public private partnership programme, which predominantly features the delivery of second-level school buildings. With so many small projects having been completed since the summer works scheme was introduced in 2003, the focus this year is on major works. As I have said previously, however, there will be a new summer works scheme in 2009.

I now wish to turn to how applications for building works are prioritised, a question that Senators have asked. In 2000-01, following consultation with the education partners, the Department published a list of criteria against which all large-scale building projects would be assessed and information on the four bands into which applications would from then on be organised, depending on the nature and urgency of the work required. Since then, when an application is received it is assessed against these criteria, looking at factors such as the demographics of the area, proposed housing developments, the condition of existing buildings, site capacity, etc. As part of this process, each project is assigned a band rating. Information on the criteria and band ratings are publicly available on the Department's website. Each school is told what its band rating is. The highest priority projects attract band 1 status, while the lowest fall into band 4. Each band rating is sub-divided to allow for selection within the bands where this becomes necessary.

As Senator Keaveney has already outlined, band 1 projects address the needs of schools in rapidly developing areas, the provision of specialist accommodation for special needs pupils, schools that are structurally unsound and rationalisation projects or amalgamations. Band 2 addresses the needs of schools that have a deficit of mainstream accommodation or which require refurbishment. There are six sub-categories in band 2. Each individual sub-category reflects the extent of an accommodation deficit or a refurbishment needed in a school.

Band 3 addresses the needs of schools that have no deficit of mainstream accommodation but that have a deficit of ancillary accommodation. There are five sub categories in band 3. Again, each sub-category reflects the extent of ancillary accommodation deficits or the extent of improvement works needed for ancillary accommodation. Band 4 addresses the needs of schools that have desirable but not urgent needs.

I specify again that each school knows exactly what is its band and sub-band rating. When it is necessary to select projects from within the same band, as a general principle, projects will be selected on the basis of enrolment stability, projects that have been the longest period in the planning process and the most cost effective solution.

I am satisfied that the prioritisation criteria are clear and unambiguous and that they bring an openness and transparency to the school building and modernisation programme. Their introduction has improved the management of the building programme in that a clear cut selection process ensures an orderly advancement, over time, of school building projects with the most urgent need being addressed first. I should also point out that with the introduction by the Government of the permanent accommodation, summer works and small schools schemes, the circulars governing these new initiatives have made it clear to schools which type of projects would qualify for funding.

The school works budget is slashed for this year.

I have already said that and I said also that the summer works scheme will be reintroduced next year.

I now turn to the current status of individual applications for building works. The school building and modernisation programme operates on a multi-annual basis. This means that the Department must constantly have projects ready to proceed as and when the budgetary situation allows. This approach ensures that the allocation in any given year is, on the one hand, spent but on the other hand it is kept under control. Any other approach would make the management of the budget virtually impossible.

The projects allowed to proceed at any given time are those that have the highest priority. For example, at the time of an announcement, while there might be a number of band 2 projects ready to go to tender and construction, the number and cost of higher band 1 rated projects ready to proceed may be such that those on band 2 cannot be approved at that time. As to when lower banded projects can proceed, this is determined by the extent of higher competing priorities on an on-going basis and the level of funding available.

This is the dynamic of the school building programme and that is why it is not possible to provide indicative delivery timeframes for lower banded projects. These can only be given when there is certainty that they can proceed, taking into account the financial resources available in any given year. Projects that will deliver extra capacity in developing areas have been given priority under the banding system since its introduction.

Delivering additional capacity in the rapidly developing areas must be a priority for the school building programme. It is projected that 100,000 additional school places will be required over the coming years. Senators will be aware that in the past newly-recognised schools have generally had to open in temporary accommodation and reference has been made to that here. I have been anxious to move away from this approach in developing areas, so there is a particular pressure on my budget this year. We are working hard to ensure that as many new schools as possible open in permanent accommodation. That is a particular pressure on our building budget but it is the right thing to do.

We will find this year that schools will open in developing areas with brand new buildings that have been built off site and dropped in with new innovative methods used, and those buildings will not be full this year——

The modular approach?

——but they will fill up over the next couple of years. It means that there is a particular draw on our budget this year because we are spending so much in those developing areas. At the same time we are aiming to progress the projects in other areas. In recent years, thousands of schools outside of developing areas have benefited from projects under the summer works and small schools schemes in recent years. Many more will benefit from improvement works under the main programme and various devolved schemes in the years ahead. It is also important to point out that all primary schools get an annual minor works grant which can be used at their discretion to carry out small-scale works.

In November 2006, the Government increased funding for the minor works grant by 44% on the previous year. Around €27 million was paid out to primary schools throughout the country late last year to enable thousands of small-scale works to be completed without the need to interact with the Department. Individual primary schools received a grant in the sum of €5,500 plus €18.50 per pupil.

The question of the provision of prefabricated accommodation has been raised on a number of occasions recently and again here this evening. Senators will be aware that demand for additional accommodation in schools has increased significantly in recent years, with the appointment of 6,000 extra teachers in the primary sector alone since 2002. In considering the need to provide extra resource and other teachers, such as language teachers teaching English as an additional language, to schools in recent years, the Government could have decided to make children wait until permanent accommodation could be provided. However, we prioritised putting the extra teachers into schools as soon as possible. This was the right decision. Against this background, my Department has nonetheless managed to keep expenditure on temporary accommodation low.

Expenditure on the rental and purchase of temporary accommodation amounted to only 6.2% of the total investment in school buildings in 2007.

Not gaeilscoileanna.

This compares with 10.8% in 2003. Suggestions often made that spending on prefabs has grown dramatically in recent years are misleading. It should be also noted that temporary accommodation is not limited to prefabs and can also involve the rental of high quality buildings. I assure Senators that the Government is determined to keep expenditure on prefabs as low as possible. The database of temporary accommodation is currently being finalised and will obviously inform the Department's future decision-making in this area.

The motion before the House today also refers to value for money. Key initiatives in this area include the production of generic repeat designs to reduce costs and the use of the design and build model to transfer more risk to contractors. As well as improving value for money, both of these developments have also helped us to deliver projects much faster. The tendering of all school building projects on a fixed price basis also underpins the requirement to achieve value for money and the new forms of Government contracts will further assist in this. The Department has also adopted a policy of devolving much greater authority to local school management boards to manage and deliver smaller building projects, thereby freeing my Department to concentrate on the larger scale projects and, again, to achieve value for money.

Senators may be also interested to know that we have prioritised energy efficiency in the interests both of the environment and of reducing schools' running costs. This has proven quite successful with modern-day schools typically using three times less energy than schools built ten years ago and using less than half the energy than what is termed as good international practice for schools.

In respect of school planning, in recent years my Department has developed much closer working relations generally with local authorities, particularly in rapidly developing areas. Last year, I met the county managers for Fingal, Meath, Kildare and Westmeath to follow up on communications between officials on school planning needs for 2008 and beyond. The motion proposes that the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Act 2006 be used for advancing future school building projects. I assure the Senators that I am very anxious to improve the procedures both for acquiring sites for schools and for securing the necessary planning permissions in a timely manner. I have met the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government to discuss how the programme for Government commitments in respect of these matters can be progressed and a range of options are currently being explored. We are also examining how the whole process of planning for schools can be improved with a view to ensuring large-scale residential developments are not approved by local authorities without adequate provision for schools.

With a view to improving its own planning procedures, my Department's school planning and building unit has been recently re-organised with the establishment of a forward planning section and a developing areas unit. A number of new staff were employed by the Department to work in these areas and there has been a significant redistribution of existing staff within the building unit. That might give rise to some of the lack of information that was given to Senators. I certainly accept that some of the answers that were given to Senator O'Toole, in particular about raising a matter on the Adjournment, were inappropriate and should not have been said to a Senator. It may be the case that staff were not able to give the information because we have made so many changes within the building unit and moved people around because of all the extra staff. I will ensure that as soon as staff settle down in their new areas of responsibility, they will be able to give whatever information is available. When dealing with all of this, what most schools want to know is whether the project is going ahead and if it is going ahead now. As Senators are aware, all of the information as to what is moving was publicly available earlier this year. I announced 38 school projects that were going to construction almost immediately. Again, people will see that they followed precisely the main banding criteria. Special schools were included because they were special schools. Schools were included that were in developing areas. We announced almost 30 new drop-in schools for developing areas which will be prioritised this year. There are schools that have been on the list for a long time. No school jumped a band, prioritisation or rating. Anybody can look at the list and see that this is the case.

The bands are not the problem. The problem relates to the stages of building.

As I outlined in my speech, band 1 will always get priority. I can only move on band 2 depending on what the costs are and the numbers in band 1 that are ready to move ahead. There is a particular problem this year because of the developing areas and the fact that we have taken a policy decision not to build them up prefab upon prefab but to put in new buildings from the beginning so that we do not make the same mistakes that were made ten years ago from which schools are still trying to escape.

The Minister, without interruption.

We should have questions and answers.

We are not having questions and answers. We are dealing with Private Members' Business.

The developing areas unit is tasked with meeting the immediate needs of areas experiencing significant increases in their school-going populations while the forward planning section is responsible for identifying more medium-term needs so that we can plan for them well in advance. To further strengthen the Department's planning capabilities, a geographic information system is currently being commissioned. This system will be capable of bringing together information from a number of different sources on increasing population trends in areas of rapid growth. In this way, we will be able to develop a digital picture of the country using these various sources of population-related data that will identify potential gaps in current or future school provision. I say this with the rider that one can get population shifts that do not become known to the local community or schools until 1 September. This has happened in areas in the past where people moved during the summer and suddenly looked for school places. Hopefully, the buildings will now be available for them, particularly with the provision of new buildings in the developing areas.

This Government has never underestimated the scale of the challenge facing us in ensuring that in the region of 4,000 schools all over the country have good quality accommodation. Significantly increased resources for the building programme have enabled record progress to be made. Transparency has been prioritised with the development, publication and implementation of the clear criteria which are used to prioritise applications for building works. There also has been an emphasis on improving value for money through the range of initiatives I have outlined. We are proud of what has been achieved in the past few years but, equally, I am fully conscious of the needs that remain throughout the country and am determined to address them, bearing in mind the needs that exist and taking into account the amount of money that is available to the Government from the taxpayers and other sources to enable us to do as much as we would like at any one time.

I thank the Independent Senators for moving this motion. I am pleased to see the Minister here tonight to listen to our concerns.

No matter what part of the country one goes to, one will find a primary school struggling with more or less the same three problems, namely, a lack of funding, school size and access routes and road safety in front of school buildings. Those are three vital issues that affect the service provided to children and their parents.

Education can have a direct impact on the state of our economy. Last week, the OECD report on the future of the Irish economy pointed out that we are not making sufficient investment in education. Inaction from the Department of Education and Science and parsimony from the Department of Finance mean that our schools are underfunded when compared to schools in the rest of Europe. As a result, teachers are struggling to provide the education that is required by our schoolchildren.

I have been in contact with a number of schools in my area in the past few days in advance of today's motion and one issue that comes up again and again is the lack of funding. The level of capitation grant is essential to the service that is provided by schools but the money they receive from the Department is barely enough to cover the costs of electricity, heating and insurance. After spending their capitation grants on these essentials, some schools cannot afford to buy a stick of chalk. They cannot afford to put additional books in the library. As a result, principals who should be dedicating their time to working out how best to provide an education for schoolchildren wonder how they will raise more money from the next cake sale or if an egg and spoon race will be held on Saturday to raise additional money.

The Department has promised to double the capitation grants but there is no indication when this money will appear. As a result, there is a concern that primary schools can be run on the generosity of parents and on how much money they can contribute.

Class sizes are also a major issue. Large class sizes have resulted largely from the lack of a coherent school planning programme at a time of an expanding commuter belt and of expanding towns and villages within that belt. Housing estates were built with no forward planning for the provision of schools and additional classrooms to cater for the increased school population. It has led to a huge increase in pressure on schools in nearby towns and a dramatic and unpredictable increase in class sizes.

I will focus on some schools in the commuter belt. Class sizes of 27 pupils per teacher are being managed in Duleek national school. Class sizes of 30 pupils per teacher are anticipated in the national school in Donore from later this year. Kentstown national school, which is in dire need of a new school building, expects to have a massive increase of pupils and it is expected it will have a pupil-teacher ratio of 33 pupils for every teacher this September. Those class sizes can be compared or contrasted with class sizes in the member states of some of our European Union colleagues. Slovakia has class sizes of 17 or 18 pupils per teacher, which is nearly half the pupil-teacher ratio we have. Despite this, we expect to compete with these countries in Europe in the future.

Stamullen national school, which is just north of Balbriggan, is also suffering in terms of class sizes. As Balbriggan has continued to grow more and more parents have found it difficult to enrol their children in schools in the town, class sizes in Stamullen national school have increased.

For a Government that made so many promises just nine months ago about how it would reduce class sizes, there is no real evidence that anything has been done. If anything, concerns about this issue are now even greater than they were in 2007. When there is a large increase in enrolments, a school can apply for development status and following approval by the Department, the allocation of additional teachers can be sanctioned for the school. However, it makes little sense that teachers in a school such as Kentstown national school or Donore national school who teach under the pressure of large class sizes must make do with their allocation for the whole academic year before the Department allocates additional teaching resources. Surely a better system should be put in place. If it is known that schools predict a large increase in enrolments, surely that can be acted on earlier than the start of the next academic year to ensure the required teachers are in place.

Another issue that is a cause of concern is the location of schools, access to them and road safety in their environs. A new commercial development has been built beside Donore national school which has caused additional traffic not only during its construction but also following it. Parents are concerned about the impact of the additional traffic on road safety and on their children accessing the school safely.

In another school in Bellewstown in east Meath, quarry traffic passes the school daily but, unfortunately, the council can only afford to improve road safety outside three schools in east Meath every year. This year road safety will be improved outside the schools in Knockcommon, Stackallen and Lobinstown, but other schools such as the school in Donacarney will have to wait their turn, and the impact it will have on children's safety is worrying. It is vital that more money is invested in initiatives such as walking buses and safe routes to schools to make it easier for children to go to and from schools.

The primary education system is the bedrock of our economy. Our future economic growth depends on it. I listened to the Minister's speech with interest but am concerned it amounts to just more empty promises. We cannot survive on empty promises. More money needs to be invested in our schools. More teachers and better school buildings are required. The Independent Senators' motion reflects that and more money needs to be invested in this important area.

I appreciate the presence of the Minister of State for this debate and that of the Minister earlier. The Government amendment states a number of facts. More money is being spent in Department of Education and Science than has ever spent previously. More money is being spent on the schools building programme. More new schools are being built and more schools are being maintained than ever previously. Despite this and partially because of something the Minister said in her contribution, expectations are not being met. Tolerance levels that prevailed many years ago were far too high for school conditions that passed for acceptable but were far too low. School communities and the parents of children rightly do not expect their children to be educated or to spend their time in an environment where they are not provided with proper resources and facilities over prolonged periods. That is the position in which we find ourselves, despite the increase in resources in this area.

Much of the frustration that exists is not only because of failure to deliver school building projects within an understandable span of time but also because of the existing information systems advising the people concerned whether their schools building project and their communities will be provided for.

I can cite an example of a public meeting I attended on 14 April concerning the Star of the Sea school in Passage West in the area I represent. Five Dáil Deputies and two Members of this House were present at that meeting. An expectation had been created regarding that school in 1999 when two primary schools merged, but it has still not been met. It is the fourth such public meeting I attended concerning that school over a three-year period and its status has not changed. When that kind of limbo approach exists towards schools building projects and the development of a community, we must recognise that the system is not working and we need to come up with better alternatives. During the nine-year timeframe while that school has been waiting for something to happen, during which little or no progress has been made, we have had four successive Ministers for Education Science and three separate systems of providing information as to where the school exists on a list within the schools building programme of the Department of Education and Science. Each of those systems was inadequate in its own right.

The encouragement offered in the Government amendment is a commitment towards providing or seeking to improve information systems, which is the crux of this problem. If people do not know the status of a school project, the expectations that are being created may never be met. The Minister spoke about the banding system, a type of a league system comprising bands 1 to 4. If a school is categorised in band 4, the school in question and community concerned can be assured that there will be very little activity or movement in the granting of that schools building project.

It is a little like asking a school and community to consider themselves the Kilkenny Gaelic football team of school provision. I did not mean to refer to the Acting Chairman's constituency. It is a reality that some teams never win games. Even if they win once every four years, what they might get——

The Senator should stop there.

He should stop digging. He is interested in sport all of a sudden.

Allow Senator Boyle to continue without interruption.

If a team manages to win a game once every four years, the nature of that win, in school terms is that a design team has been appointed. That is the case of the school in Cork in respect of which several of us attended a public meeting the other day. That is the essence of the frustration experienced by all public representatives. It is not so much the matter of the banding system but the stages of the schools building project in the building programme.

Hear, hear. Will the Senator explain that to the Minister? She seems to have missed that point completely. Congratulations to the Deputy on that point.

Allow Deputy Boyle to continue without interruption.

The appointment of a design team or any stages in the building programme should be accompanied with a minimum and maximum time period. People should know how quickly a project will be completed or how long it is likely to take to complete it.

These are the types of information systems we need. To achieve these, there is a need to build on existing resources. The programme for Government that I helped negotiate——

If the phone was answered, that could be achieved.

That would help as well. I noted the Senator's earlier contributions.

The Green Party is running the country.

Allow Senator Boyle to continue without interruption.

The programme for Government that I helped negotiate sought a frontloading of funding in education which was meant to be €350 million in the first year.

We did not get it.

We are in a period of economic adjustment. The frontloading was €125 million this year.

We did not get it.

That expectation to deliver on the €350 million funding still exists and, as far as we are concerned as a party in Government, it will be delivered upon. When delivered, it will provide the seed capital that will bring about the changes we need in terms of resources to try to complete the school building programme in the shortest possible time.

The motion is not calling for resources.

I understand that. I accept that the wider problem is people not having knowledge of where their schools are placed on the programme and the fact that expectations, where they exist, are not being met or cannot be met because the system does not allow for people to know on foot of full information.

The amendment proposed by the Government includes the key commitment of working towards improving the information-giving systems. As a member of the Government, that is a commitment I hope the Minister can deliver upon. I do not want to see a situation whereby the school in which I have attended four public meetings in the past three years will conduct a further four public meetings but will still be at the same stage with the same level of expectation and with no-one in the political system either providing them with answers or with hope that what they as a community should have a right to expect will be delivered upon.

I wish to share time with Senator Fitzgerald. The motion before us is timely. The Minister gave us a flowery speech with lots of waffle and rhetoric.

She gave us facts about what is being spent.

I restate the arguments of Senators O'Toole and Boyle. This motion is not about finance or resourcing but about categorisation and about people knowing where they are on the schools building programme.

The motion is about providing answers to school principals, staff, parents and pupils. If the Minister of State at the Department of Education and Science, Deputy Haughey, does nothing else tonight but relays that simple message to the Minister, we will have got somewhere. If Senator Boyle can use his influence in Government, which he professes to have, then he will have done a great day's work.

There are schools in my constituency of Cork South-Central to which Deputy Micheál Martin, the former Minister for Education and Science, made a plethora of promises. I will not name those promises but we all know what they are. There is no transparency, accountability or openness in the Department regarding the school building programme.

I telephoned the Department recently to inquire about the Star of the Sea school in Passage West. I was told that the principal officer who had been dealing with the matter had moved to another section. The person to whom I spoke claimed to have only taken over responsibility and suggested I call again in four weeks' time. I rang again and was told that the person responsible had changed jobs again. It is not good enough.

Why are Members of this House constantly tabling matters on the Adjournment and why are our colleagues in the other House tabling endless numbers of parliamentary questions about the schools building programme? It is because of sheer frustration. If Members on the Government side put themselves in the position of a school principal, the chairman of a board of management, a teacher in a sub-standard school or a pupil who is being educated in a school with no running water or with sub-standard toilet facilities, they would not be happy either. They should not tell us that everything is great. We know there has been substantial investment in schools. The former Deputy, Ray MacSharry, coined the phrase "boom and bloom", but boom and bloom has been replaced by absolute chaos in the schools building programme.

The people are despondent and angry and are waiting in the long grass. The teachers of Ireland are sick of it. This is not a matter of the INTO playing politics. It is about absolute, genuine frustration. I say that as a former schoolteacher who meets colleagues daily. Let us have a debate about transparency and openness.

The bands are fine but schools do not know where they go when they get to band 3, 2 or 1. How do they get onto step one of the categorisation? When will they be told they can move from the design to the build phase? The people in Passage West watched while a school up the road from them was fast-tracked by Ministers playing politics. That is not good enough. We are talking about the children of Ireland and our education system. If we are serious about being a knowledge-based economy, the Government must be honest and transparent with the people, which is not happening at present. Senator Boyle knows that quite well and would agree with me.

It is about time we woke up to the reality. Let us get rid of the scripts. We have Adjournment debates in the House and they are a joke and a farce. My six-year old niece could write the replies. We get flowery rhetoric.

Education works, so.

It does, thanks to the teachers. The Senator is dead right. We get flowery rhetoric but no delivery and no accountability. The time has come to deliver on the schools building programme and to be honest with schools and boards of management. They should be told when their waiting time begins and ends.

I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this motion and I congratulate the Independent Senators on tabling it. What is clear from comments from all Senators is that the secrecy and mystery around the school building programme must go. It causes endless upset to teachers, boards of management, parents and children.

We need more transparency and this motion says it all regarding the schools building programme. I hope the Department will take on board what it says. What is the problem with being open about the decision-making involved? It will help everyone and will take pressure off the Department and the Minister. If there was a tracking procedure, for example, whereby people could consult the Department via its website or by telephone and obtain proper information, it would ease the pressure on the Department in many ways. The lack of transparency, the secrecy and the lack of information means schools do not know where they are on the list or what the waiting time will be. This causes enormous frustration, disappointment and anger among parents and children.

There are a number of schools in my constituency which have been waiting for schools building projects to begin. Pupils from St. Brigid's school in Palmerstown visited this House approximately two weeks ago. They asked me when they would be moving into the prefabs so that their school could be refurbished. Those prefabs cost €10,000 per month to rent and are standing empty. They have been in place since September 2007 when pupils expected to move while the school was being refurbished. The Department of Education and Science has spent €80,000 already on rent for prefabs that are unused. They are under a one-year contract so they will cost a total of €120,000. That is wasteful and inefficient as well as being disappointing for everyone involved. The refurbishment of the school has been put on hold and no one knows what is going to happen to the prefabs. Will the contract be renewed for a further year? No one can find out what is going on. I cannot find out, either through Adjournment debates or parliamentary questions tabled by my colleagues, when the school will be provided with the money required for its refurbishment.

Gaelscoil na Camóige, a school in Clondalkin, is in a most appalling condition. The problems have existed since the school opened eight years ago, including holes in the floor. The conditions are dreadful for the children attending that school. A new gaelscoil complex was promised before the general election last year but there is no timeframe, transparency or clarity on when whatever band the school is in will mean delivery of a new school building.

The list goes on. Another school in my constituency, St. Andrew's, was told the Department of Education and Science is looking for a site for the school. To the best of my knowledge, the same reply has been given time and again with no sense of progress being made. No one knows when the school will get a site or funding to develop, even though the school has a long waiting list.

Where is the transparency? Why is it missing? Where is the accountability? How can one establish where schools lie in order of priority and the rationale behind their positions in the Department's priority list? That is what is needed and the motion before the House addresses all of those issues. I ask the Department and the Minister to take on board the contents of this motion and make the kinds of changes recommended therein.

I wish to share my time with Senator O'Sullivan. In the National Development Plan 2000-2006, funding of €2.6 billion was provided for 7,800 building projects. A further €4.5 billion is to be invested in school buildings in the next few years. The crux of this issue is that the new planning and building unit has been reorganised along with the forward planning section for developing areas. The Minister has placed huge emphasis on this and it is important that the unit liaises with local authorities, identifies where schools are needed and ensures they are delivered as quickly as possible. That is what the Minister and myself want and we must push for this.

Information systems must be improved. Population trends must be assessed for enrolment at primary level and increased migration must be taken into account. The Minister emphasised she wants transparency about this and she has made no bones about that.

I also welcome the proposed joined up thinking involving the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, local authorities, county managers, the Minister for Education and Science and the Dublin transport authority. All the stakeholders should work closely when planning schools building projects.

I recall when I was a member of South Dublin County Council being involved in drafting a local area plan for Adamstown, which worked well. We assessed the area's needs, acquired a school site, developed the infrastructure in the area and everything worked beautifully. This method may not work properly everywhere but it has worked for me and Adamstown is a prime example of joined up thinking working on the ground. That must be the way forward and this is the Minister's concept for the future. Housing, education and community facilities must be considered together and that must be replicated throughout the State.

The information systems used by the building unit must be improved because this is a weakness. However, the Minister has put emphasis on opening up our thinking on how we link with the public at large. Her heart is in the right place and she wants to go in the same direction as us. The building unit must be upgraded and she will take note of the issues raised in the debate.

I thank Senator Ormonde for sharing time. I support the amendment to the motion but I cannot pretend that I fail to understand from where Senator O'Toole and his Independent colleagues are coming. Anybody in the real world or anybody who comes from an education background like myself will be aware of the immense frustration of school authorities at primary and secondary level regarding where they stand on the building programme.

I would like to instance three schools in my constituency, Kerry North. Drumclough national school may have been mentioned by Senator O'Toole who is very involved with it. The authorities have been waiting two years for a technical inspection team to visit. That is difficult to explain because it is a matter of priority, not planning. Listowel Presentation primary school has seven prefabricated buildings and it is groaning for space. The school authorities do not know what band they are on and when progress will be made. They cannot make proper plans for the future. I was briefed earlier by Councillor Norma Foley from Tralee on Blennerville national school. The school authorities have a major problem. They were approved for a new school in 2000 and eight years later students are in rooms measuring 17 sq ft and nothing is happening.

The Minister rightly expects that local authorities will consider educational provision when they grant planning permissions for large scale residential developments. I spent 25 years in local government and there are two sides to that story. It is a big ask of county planners to unilaterally say they cannot grant permission for a 50-house development, for example, because access is not available for a school. There must be communication in this regard and this has particularly affected the development of gaelscoileanna in Kerry, of which I approve and support 100%. Very often the enthusiasm to establish a gaelscoil outruns common sense and provision. Gaelscoileanna have started up in unsuitable accommodation such as private houses and the local authority is then expected to provide school wardens, roads, lighting and so on. It is a two-way issue. The Department must put up its hands and get involved as well.

I commend the Minister on her move to rationalise education. She initiated the north Kerry educational review and it has been a great success. It is supported by the trustees of the various schools, parents, teachers and boards of management. If such a hands-on approach were taken on school planning, it might be a better way to go. As Senator Ormonde said, the Minister's heart is in the right place. Money is important to every venture and perhaps it is not as flúirseach as it was over the past five years. We must be sympathetic towards the Minister's position in that respect but the Department has questions to answer and it needs to be more hands on in the provision of school buildings.

I wish to share time with Senator Mullen. I welcome the Minister of State to the House for this useful and pertinent debate. Senator O'Toole refers to the inordinate amount of parliamentary time consumed by these matters. Every Member has tabled an Adjournment matter on schools building projects and has large files on the matter and numerous examples have been outlined in the debate. The Minister attempted to address a number of the issues but, as Senator O'Toole said to me when I whispered in his shell like ear, what one needs is the spade in the ground. Getting on to bands may sound good but action, a timetable and information are needed. One does not need to be given the run-around and this is why there is so much frustration among school authorities and why they write to even people like myself. Members receive a significant number of inquiries in this regard.

The motion is extremely sensible, as it proposes clear visibility in the criteria and clear accountability so that schools know their ranking and have an idea of the date for a project. There are too many prefabricated buildings and it is not fair on the children. I welcome Senator Boyle's contribution. He proposed a decent approach. He accepts the reality, as did Senator O'Sullivan, and it is not easy when one is on the Government benches to acknowledge this. That indicates we are all going in the same direction, although it is not possible for the Government Members to be as trenchant as some of us.

I refer to the new Carbury school in Sligo. It is the only Protestant school in the town. It began as a model school in a historic building, which is now the Model Arts and Niland Gallery, having been handed over by the board of management. In 1977 a new school was built on a site belonging to the Incorporated Society of Ireland, next door to Sligo grammar school. Because the school has been successful, conditions are cramped, with six portakabins on the campus. Three are used as classrooms, two for resource classes and one as a staffroom. The school has no dedicated assembly hall for daily use. The teachers and pupils must juggle between classrooms, having to move desks and so on to take part in indoor activities. The portakabins are rented, which is an expense. The parents have raised the amount required — €63,000.

In 2006, the Department granted approval for a new school building and planning permission was granted in April 2007. The parents have been campaigning for the school for ten years. They were asked to get ready to decamp. They received planning permission in December 2007 and in the same month a decision was made not to proceed. This is dreadful and demonstrates the kind of agony and frustration applicants are put through.

This matter related to Carbury school, but to demonstrate the non-sectarian nature of my interest in my constituency, I would like to refer to the Holy Rosary national school in Oldcourt, Dublin 24. Sr. Mary O'Neill and some of the parents were in touch with me about the school. One of the pupils wrote to me and said they used to have a playing field, but now it is covered with portakabins. This little girl told me she and her friend found a dead rat one day and a girl who walked on it was sick and had to go home as a result. This is grim stuff for a child to endure. A mother of some of these children wrote to me and said her oldest child is in a prefab and her next child will be in one next year. They move the children on from the prefabs each year because the conditions are so bleak. The buildings are miserable, cold and rat infested.

Conditions are terrible. Teachers going to class have to drive their cars between the prefabs in the playground and it is only a matter of time before a child is injured. The home-school-community liaison teacher has a desk in a corridor. Is this acceptable in this day and age, considering these cold, flimsy prefabs cost the State a non-returnable €100,000 a year?

The Minister also should give consideration to the Montessori schools which are anomalous because they get no funding at all. The Montessori school in Celbridge, the Glebe Montessori junior school, needs to upgrade its building and equipment, but it gets no assistance because it is not on the register. This is another little bureaucratic technical manoeuvre that gets the Department out of funding one of the best educational systems in the country. I hope the Minister takes this on board and considers the possibility of providing funding to Montessori schools which do such an excellent job, in particular the one at Glebe.

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I thank Senator O'Toole for tabling this motion and support the proposals he has made. Like Senator Norris, I too have been in touch with individual cases in this regard. Some time ago the principal of a school in my parish, Eglish national school in Ahascragh, County Galway, wrote to me. Although the principal provided an excellent summary of the situation in the school, it had to be seen to be believed. I spent some time in the school and thought I would see the problems the principal had outlined in her letter in 20 minutes, but it took an hour or more to view the various problems. The problems are typical. The school has approximately 48 pupils, has no central heating and is very draughty, which gives rise to a terrible waste of money because a significant proportion of the capitation is spent on ESB payments. The principal had described in her letter the mould and damp throughout the school and had mentioned that a family of snails had taken up permanent residence on the ceiling of one of the classrooms. She had not exaggerated, because I met that family subsequently during my visit.

In fairness to the Department, the principal's letter was given a sympathetic response and she has been in touch with the Department's planning and modernisation section. However, an interesting point to consider is whether there is flexibility in the system. Senator O'Toole and others have spoken eloquently about the importance of having a transparent system where people will know exactly what stage their school is at. The Department gave approval to Eglish national school for a devolved grant to build prefabs on the footprint of the school and it hopes to get a more permanent facility, but when it sent its plans to the prefab manufacturers it was offered another option and told it could have a more permanent modular school building, to the same specification, for a relatively small extra cost. In such a case, does the Department have the flexibility to choose the good economic option and allow what is needed?

It did it in Moville.

I accept there must be an emphasis on developing areas and ones of rapid population expansion, but it is also important not to forget rural areas. In County Cavan, for example, we see the greatest increase in enrolment apart from Dublin.

We also need to know about current planning and whether there is real vision in what the Department is doing. Take for example the new proposed Phoenix Park community national school which is to be opened in September 2008. We have discovered that this school is in the wrong place and has a very small enrolment application, not even enough to make an infant class. Why has this gone ahead, particularly when in St. Brigid's national school in the parish of Castleknock there are still approximately 20 vacant places and also vacant places in Blanchardstown. Why was the decision made to situate the Phoenix Park school in that area?

The Muslim community in north Dublin has been offered a site for its school that is outside its catchment area. If the school moves to that site, it will lose half its enrolment, but if it does not move, it will be pushed back down the list. We seem to have a situation where the Department asks what sites are available, what schools want a site and decides a school should go to one of these sites regardless of the school catchment area and where people live.

I will finish with a plea for consultation. It is vital the Department continues to consult all relevant parties. I am aware the commission on school accommodation has failed to meet trustees and education partners for three years. Why do we have a situation where boards of management are told to prepare for building while trustees are not spoken to until the last minute? This is a sign of bad planning and communication and I hope it ends soon.

I wish to share my time with Senator Joe O'Reilly.

Is that agreed? Agreed.

I welcome the Minister of State to the House, but I am somewhat disappointed the Minister had to leave as only she can understand what I have to say. I support the motion moved by the Independent Senators and commend them on tabling it. I have raised the matter of the band ratings of schools several times on the Adjournment.

While the Minister was in the House she spoke about schools in developing areas. Athlone community college is in a developing area but the plans for its development have been dragging on for years. A public meeting has been called for next week, to which all Oireachtas Members have been invited. The new development unit in the Department appears to me to act as another delaying tactic and a cause of confusion for the parents and teachers in Athlone community college. The college went to tender and design stage and has been years waiting for development, but all of a sudden, in response to the matter which I raised on the Adjournment last week, we have been told that a development unit has been set up for developing areas. Athlone has been a developing area for a long time. The school is to cater for 1,000 pupils and already has that number of pupils. Therefore, there is no need for it to go through a procedure involving the development unit. I feel frustrated by the ráiméis that is being thrown at us in this regard.

The principal of a school in Nenagh wrote to me about the summer works scheme. I do not know why he wrote to me because I am from Athlone but I suppose as a Senator I represent all the country. I welcome his letter. The summer works scheme was an excellent scheme and I welcome the announcement of its return. However, what are schools to do this year? The architect told the principal of the school in Nenagh that all areas checked need serious attention and should not be left as they were much longer as they pose a health and safety risk in their current state. No other alternatives to the summer works scheme are available for such works. What is the school to do while its pupils face these health and safety risks? The Minister said the scheme will be available again next year, but what are school principals to do in the meantime?

Let the schools fall apart.

Can the Minister of State find out and inform me in writing the situation with regard to the devolved building programme scheme? Funding was made available through this scheme to local communities so that they could get involved in building their own schools. This scheme would work well in an area such as Killucan which is a developing area with significant numbers of new houses. This proactive community has found its own site so this scheme would work well for it.

I acknowledge that the Minister has met the Westmeath county manager to discuss the situation, which is a good idea. As chairman of the strategic planning committee, I had asked for a school needs assessment. We need this sort of joined-up thinking in each county.

I thank my colleague, Senator McFadden, for being so generous in sharing time with me. I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Seán Haughey, a former member of this House. I congratulate my INTO colleague, Senator Joe O'Toole, on tabling this excellent and timely motion with his Independent colleagues. I try not to be deliberately political in this House but it remains the case that the issue of school buildings is used as a political football throughout the country.

Government Deputies and Senators have access to information on planned works and break the news locally before the public announcement.

They do this before elections.

The imminent building of a number of schools — there is a glaring case in my own area in Virginia, County Cavan — was announced during the previous general election, but as yet there is not a sod turned. Unfortunately, such sinister and cynical announcements are common in politics at present and this needs to change. We need objective criteria and fair, transparent tracking procedures. It must be clear to people where they stand in the pecking order, the reason they stand there and how the waiting system works. If we do not separate such announcements from narrow party politics, all confidence will be eroded. The Department of Education and Science should establish an e-mail address so that schools may access information about their position and what will happen at any time. The schools should know their ranking.

There has been poor planning for increases in population. In south County Cavan, which is part of the area I represent, there has been a population explosion due to the growth of the Dublin commuter belt. This has not been reflected by an increase in the number of school buildings. There should be co-ordination between the planning sections of local authorities and the planning unit of the Department of Education and Science as a matter of urgency. Schools must be built to meet a burgeoning population.

It is perverse and wrong that portakabins are taking up space in playing areas in schools and it is equally perverse that these cost significant sums of money in the short term. It is similarly perverse that we need distinct architectural reports and designs for individual schools. Several in-house designs at departmental level should be available instantly.

There needs to be an immediate audit of where we stand and a transparent system put in place so that for eternity — this will apply to my party in Government in the future — no party will ever engender mystique around the building of schools and no party can mollify and fool the people, who subvent these schools, into believing they are in a certain position and that political patronage is giving them their school. We need an objective process immediately. This is urgent and I congratulate my Independent colleagues on tabling this motion which merits a proper response from the Minister of State, Deputy Seán Haughey. The Minister of State should put his hands up, be generous and say that it is time to end the nonsense.

I echo the sentiments of Senator O'Reilly and thank the Independent Senators for tabling this motion. The first line of the motion refers to the inordinate amount of parliamentary time consumed by a contentious stream of Adjournment motions. I have brought four of these since Christmas and I need to bring another motion next week.

I am sure Senators on all sides of the House know of examples of schools, whether primary or secondary, where there are ongoing difficulties with the schools building programme and placement of these schools on the programme. I welcome the opportunity to have a full and frank discussion about the problems that pertain to this matter.

I am disappointed by some of the sentiments I have heard. I did not hear the remarks of the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Mary Hanafin, but I read what she said. It seems to me from some of the sentiments expressed by Senators on the Government side of the House that, to an extent, they are talking out of both sides of their mouth on this subject. They accept the merits of the motion yet they will vote for the Government amendment. This is rather neat as it ignores completely the motion we are discussing and the amendment does not tackle any of the substantive issues raised.

An issue that has bothered me when examining the schools accommodation system is the excessive reliance in many areas on prefabricated buildings and several previous speakers have mentioned this. I was alerted to the startling fact that since 2000, Government spending on prefabricated structures in schools has increased ninefold to more than €35 million last year. If ever there was a case of being penny-wise and pound-foolish this is it. In a response to a parliamentary question recently the Minister for Education and Science was not able to outline the number of prefabricated school buildings in the State. The Minister said that such statistics were only available on school files and not in the Department of Education and Science. This is the reason a central part of this motion proposes there should be an audit of school buildings, lands and prefabricated buildings attached to schools throughout the country.

I know of a number of schools including Coláiste Pobail Osraí — the Minister of State, Deputy Seán Haughey, was in the House some weeks ago dealing with this issue — where no site has yet been agreed for a building. It has been a struggle to get engineers from the Department of Education and Science on site to examine the options. Colaiste Pobail Osraí has had continual problems with the number of students housed in prefabricated buildings.

Scoil Airegail in Ballyhale, County Kilkenny, is a relatively modern secondary school and the main school building was built approximately 15 years ago. However, up to half the students there are accommodated in prefabricated buildings, which defeats the purpose of building a new school. Ballinkillen national school in County Carlow is another example where this is the case. The entire gaelscoil in Carrick-on-Suir which is on the edge of my constituency — my first cousin is a teacher there — is a prefabricated building. It does not have a single solid structure.

I refer to the shocking situation with regard to education in New Ross, County Wexford, which I raised recently with the Minister of State, Deputy Seán Haughey, and some of his colleagues. In this case because of the ongoing difficulties with the amalgamation of primary and secondary level, there has been no capital funding for schools in New Ross for the past six years. It was either Senator McFadden or Senator O'Reilly who mentioned that schools are installing prefabricated buildings in the playing areas. At St. Canice's national school in Rosbercon the multi-purpose room is now two classrooms and there are four prefabricated buildings in the yard. They do not have a playing area of any description anymore. There are numerous other examples throughout the country.

I echo the sentiments of Senator Joe O'Toole on the governance issues. I am not very information technology literate but I spent several hours this afternoon trying to decipher the Department of Education and Science website. To say it is not user-friendly would be putting it mildly.

The customer charter reads well.

The customer charter reads well but as Senator Shane Ross mentioned——

The implementation charter is different.

Senator Ross is correct to mention that a school principal, parent or pupil should be able to look at the departmental website and see where they are on the waiting list for additional school buildings.

Senators Ross and O'Reilly were among the previous speakers who mentioned the perception of stroke pulling in the area of providing new school buildings. Whether it exists in reality, the perception exists. If the Government is to do anything, it is essential that it no longer allows the provision of school buildings, whether at primary or secondary level, to be a political football. It is clear to me a points system needs to be put in place. Senator Dan Boyle mentioned a band system, which is not mentioned in the amendment. Perhaps the Minister for Education and Science mentioned it. Some local authorities operate housing lists on the basis of a weighted or points system. This type of system for school buildings should be put in place. There is an urban-rural conflict. Senator McFadden referred to urban areas such as Athlone where the population has increased greatly in the past ten years, leading to a scarcity of school facilities. In many cases schools in urban areas have been provided with prefabricated buildings which is a short-term measure, whereas schools in rural areas have problems with loss of teachers, dilapidated buildings and infestation by all sorts of undesirable creatures.

This motion is clear in its intent and I endorse it wholeheartedly. I congratulate the Independent Senators for tabling it and it would be beneficial to the provision of educational facilities and services if it were to be adopted by the Government. I am disappointed at the mealy-mouthed amendment proposed by the Government.

This is a magnificent motion and I also congratulate the Independent Senators on tabling it. Much good sense about not making the subject of school buildings a political football has been spoken tonight. This has been the case all too often, particularly at election time. I refer to two schools in my area, Bunnyconnellan national school and an extension to the sports hall at Davitt College in Castlebar, which have been used as political footballs on numerous occasions. I am disappointed with the Minister for Education and Science in regard to a sports hall for Davitt College in Castlebar which has been coming on stream every year for the past 20 years. Prior to the last general election the Minister for Education and Science informed us it was on the way, but there is still no sign of the funding. I ask the Minister of State to bring to the attention of the Minister the cases of Bunnyconnellan national school and the urgent need for a sports hall for Davitt College in Castlebar. I am being parochial but this is a school of 600 to 700 pupils and it does not have a sports hall which is unusual in this day and age.

I cannot understand why the Department of Education and Science does not use standard plans for a one, two, three or four-teacher national school. The Department goes to the expense of hiring very expensive architects who produce extensive plans when a two-teacher or three-teacher school should be the same whether it is in Donegal, Dublin, Mayo or Kerry. That makes common sense but the Department of Education and Science and the architects employed to build all these different types of new schools do not seem to think that. One can recognise a school building a mile away and they cost a fortune in architects' fees. The process should be streamlined and simple off-the-shelf plans that could be rushed through should be used in order that extensions or new school buildings, particularly for two to five teachers, are not delayed.

I am pleased to have the opportunity to make those points. I appeal to the Minister to put in place a mechanism so that people can find out where in the queue lies their school project, whether it is an extension, a new school or a sports hall. This would remove much of the drudgery for politicians and for parents who are often very excited at the prospect of obtaining such facilities for their children, which they deserve. As Senator Joe O'Reilly said, people should have access to a website where they can view the progress in the queue of their school projects.

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Haughey, to the House and thank him for paying attention to the debate. I thank all the Senators who spoke in the debate. These include Senators Keaveney, Healy Eames, Hannigan, Boyle, Buttimer, Fitzgerald, Ormonde, O'Sullivan, Norris, Mullen, McFadden, O'Reilly, Phelan and Burke and their contributions contained a common theme. I refer to the point made by Senator Burke, the Leas-Chathaoirleach, about the design issue. This is not a new idea. Anyone driving around the country will easily recognise a school building, such as the one visited by Senator Mullen in Ahascragh, which are what I describe as the Boyd Barrett-type schools. They were designed by Boyd Barrett in the 1950s and 1960s and are long schools with a water tower to one side.

This is not a new idea. More than 20 or 25 years ago I made a presentation to the Department of Education that there should be a set number of pre-designed schools. I received a contemptuous response from the Department in which I was asked whether I was trying to "bungalow bliss" primary school buildings. People of a certain age will remember a book of house designs called Bungalow Bliss, written by a former Member of this House, Jack Fitzsimons from County Meath. It was a cheap method of sourcing house designs in the late 1960s and early 1970s. I understand the Department has made a move in that direction and it has a number of standard plans which it will propose.

I ask the Minister of State to take note of a few points. Politics is being demeaned by this process. Irrespective of whether it is true, people believe that focal sa chúirt is what is making this work. I listened to a man on the radio this morning who spoke about receiving a letter from the Minister before the election stating that a project was going to start and I listened to Senator Burke talking about the sports hall in Castlebar which was promised also in a letter sent before the election, but neither has happened.

I ask my colleagues on the Government side to take note that there is no mention of resources in my motion tonight. I deliberately did not include the issue of resources so that it would not be necessary for people to tell me what the Government is spending. Whether there is €1 million, €1 billion or €10 billion to be expended, the issues I set out in my motion must be dealt with. It is disgraceful that the senior Minister in the Department in her response was not able to deal with the questions of audit — internal and external — of governance or of inventory, except in a passing reference to rented prefabricated buildings. That is the measure of the importance of the motion. It is disgraceful that whoever put the speech together in the Department could not even answer questions on simple issues.

I want to say something else to my colleagues on the Government side. There is no mention of bands. A page and a half of the Minister's speech referred to bands but there was no need for that as the information can be downloaded from the website which contains six pages about the different bands——

The Senator asked about priorities in his motion.

No, I did not. I asked for criteria. I am glad Senator Keaveney is paying such close attention. How does one go from the bands to the building? What have the bands got to do with a building being built?

It prioritises the building.

(Interruptions).

Senator O'Toole without interruption.

There has been no mention in the debate of the stages of the building process. These are the preliminary stage, initial sketch scheme, sketch and design stage, detailed design, tender action and evaluation, construction and hand-over of works.

The stages are designed to confuse.

The Minister did not say a word about these stages. This leaves the House with a shortfall in information. It precisely illustrates the point I am making that one can hear much but learn nothing.

If the Minister says a particular school is in band 1 and outlines the appropriate criteria, I accept that without question. The question is, as Senator Norris asked, how a school can move from band 1 to the stage where a spade is put in the ground. How long after attaining band 1 status will the JCBs move in? When a school gets to the detailed design and sketch stage, how does it move to the next stage? Reference was made during this debate to a school whose management was told 11 years ago that a design team would be assigned. Nothing has happened. I heard a school manager speaking on the radio this morning about the absence of any progress since he received a letter from the Minister in October 2006 informing him that a design team was to be appointed to the school. Blennerville national school in Tralee began the application process in 1996 and was told it was ready to move to stage one. The school is still waiting for a design team to be sent in. Dromclough national school is waiting since January 2006 for a design team. Rahan national school in Mallow is awaiting the arrival of the design team it was promised in 2003 or 2004. There are too many such examples to recount.

This is the crux of the issue. It is not a question of the bands but rather the stages of the building process. Every time a particular schools building project is raised on the Adjournment debate, including schools in Senator Keaveney's county, the question is always about when the design team will come or when the construction contract will be put out to tender. Today, however, the Minister did not make even a passing reference to this process for the simple reason that she did not dare do so. I understand well her reluctance.

She offered no specifics.

I completely agree with the Minister that the urgent will always displace the less urgent. That is the nature of prioritising, and political leadership is about setting priorities. In the case at hand, I accept that a school which is considered the number one priority one week may, for various reasons, be displaced by another school the following week. There is nothing wrong with that. However, when was the last time we heard anyone in the Department of Education and Science be truthful to any school authority in this regard? If that information were made available, we could assess whether it is right or wrong, fair or otherwise.

The points I have raised do not relate to resources. There is nothing in this motion that requires an increased allocation of resources. The fewer the resources, the more important it is that there should be accountability. The reality is that the Department of Finance has issued a demand for internal audit processes, but we heard nothing about that in the debate. As I mentioned earlier, the Department of the Taoiseach has set up a new structure to oversee a briefing and organisational review programme dealing with such issues as customer service and delivery, governance, and customer and stakeholder feedback. None of these issues is currently being heeded. There is an information deficit. Senator Boyle made the same point although he did not express it as eloquently as I have. We must tackle these deficiencies.

I assure the Minister of State, Deputy Haughey, that I will not relent on this issue. Any Member who wishes to raise a particular schools building project on the Adjournment must be prepared to box clever. An té nach bhfuil láidir, ní foláir dó bheith glic. He who is not strong must be a little clever. I suggest that Members be more specific in framing these Adjournment matters. We must ask precisely what stage in the building process the school is at and exactly what is required to advance to the next stage.

I intend to table an Adjournment matter asking the Minister to explain the internal audit process and the quality assurance schemes that are in place. I will ask direct questions which the Minister may refuse to answer. In that case, I will approach the Committee of Public Accounts, either by writing to it or asking to make a presentation. I will ask all these questions and have them answered. We are talking about taxpayers' money. There would be uproar, for example, if the national lottery used the same types of blindfolded procedures for spending the moneys assigned to it. The same accountability is required of the schools building programme.

Amendment put.
The Seanad divided: Tá, 29; Níl, 18.

  • Boyle, Dan.
  • Brady, Martin.
  • Butler, Larry.
  • Callanan, Peter.
  • Callely, Ivor.
  • Cannon, Ciaran.
  • Carty, John.
  • Cassidy, Donie.
  • Daly, Mark.
  • de Búrca, Déirdre.
  • Ellis, John.
  • Feeney, Geraldine.
  • Glynn, Camillus.
  • Hanafin, John.
  • Keaveney, Cecilia.
  • Leyden, Terry.
  • MacSharry, Marc.
  • McDonald, Lisa.
  • O’Brien, Francis.
  • O’Donovan, Denis.
  • O’Malley, Fiona.
  • O’Sullivan, Ned.
  • Ó Domhnaill, Brian.
  • Ó Murchú, Labhrás.
  • Ormonde, Ann.
  • Phelan, Kieran.
  • Walsh, Jim.
  • White, Mary M.
  • Wilson, Diarmuid.

Níl

  • Bradford, Paul.
  • Burke, Paddy.
  • Buttimer, Jerry.
  • Coffey, Paudie.
  • Coghlan, Paul.
  • Cummins, Maurice.
  • Donohoe, Paschal.
  • Fitzgerald, Frances.
  • Hannigan, Dominic.
  • Healy Eames, Fidelma.
  • McFadden, Nicky.
  • Mullen, Rónán.
  • Norris, David.
  • O’Reilly, Joe.
  • O’Toole, Joe.
  • Phelan, John Paul.
  • Regan, Eugene.
  • Twomey, Liam.
Tellers: Tá, Senators Diarmuid Wilson and Deirdre de Búrca; Níl, Senators Joe O’Toole and David Norris.
Amendment declared carried.
Motion, as amended, put and declared carried.
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