Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 12 July 2022
552. Deputy Alan Dillon asked the Minister for Education if she will provide each project life cycle stage and the estimated period for completion for these stages undertaken by the planning and building unit for the delivery of capital projects under the additional accommodation scheme. [37618/22]
View answerThere are five stages of architectural planning involved in the delivery of both major and Additional School Accommodation (ASA) school projects. The stages reflect the Capital Works Management Framework developed by the Department of Public Expenditure & Reform.
The stages are as follows:
Stage 1 – Preliminary Design;
Stage 2 - Design including planning where required;
Stage 3 - Tender Action, Evaluation and Award;
Stage 4 – Construction;
Stage 5 - Handover of Works and Final Account
ASA projects are demand led and devolved to school authorities for implementation. The length of time a project takes to go through each stage varies and depends on a number of factors, including scale and complexity, and is subject to the time it takes to progress through the statutory approval process including planning where required. My Department has good streamlined arrangements in place to facilitate timely review of stages submissions to enable projects progress as quickly as possible.
My Department has a large pipeline of projects for delivery under the school building programme. The main elements of this pipeline currently involve in excess of 1,300 school building projects for delivery under the Department’s Large Scale and Additional Accommodation Scheme. These projects are currently in progress across the various stages of planning, design, tender and construction. Most of which are expected to be either under construction or completed in the period up to 2025 and are being progressed as quickly as possible. The current status of these projects being delivered is listed on a county by county basis on www.gov.ie and is updated on a monthly basis to reflect their progress through the various stages.
