I thank the Ceann Comhairle for allowing me to raise this problem on the Adjournment. Lismullen national school is located two miles outside Navan. The old part of the school was built in the 1930s; the school I attended is a similar type school and it was built in 1937. A small two room extension was added in recent years. There are 165 pupils at present and the inadequacy of the facilities has been known to the Department since 1986. There has been little response apart from letters and there has been no positive reaction to the needs of the pupils, teachers and parents.
There is no purpose built PE room and the entire PE programme is taken outdoors, so it is obviously impossible to implement a huge por tion of the programme without indoor accommodation. Each year when the school wants to stage performances for parents, which is part of the extracurricular activities teachers do, they must go to institutions outside the immediate area for a venue.
There is also insufficient room in the school for proper parent-teacher meetings. The staff room is a converted cloakroom which is barely adequate in size and almost every day when visitors such as parents come to the school, discussions must take place in the corridors. There are no storage facilities and consequently one of the school corridors is totally congested, blocking a fire exit. That is a fact. There is nowhere to put equipment, as I saw when I was in the school last week.
That is unacceptable in this day and age. There are two prefabricated buildings with low ceilings which are inadequate for the number of pupils in the school. The school requires a computer room, as it is essential today that a school has IT facilities available to it. There is one computer in every classroom as there is no space in the rooms for any more.
The principal and parents' council of the school want funding for a new hall as well as an office, library, computer room, adequate storage space, staff car parking and room for parents to pull in when collecting children as parking on the road is very dangerous.
There is no Minister for Education and Science present and it is disappointing to say the least that neither is available. Is it possible that a meeting could be set up so that a deputation from the school can be received in order that this matter can be brought forward? I thought having to wait five to eight years for such facilities was gone given the amount of money around. This kind of situation should not continue. I spent my early years in this House making representations to have schools built across my constituency but here we are in 2001 with a primary school looking for a small amount of money to provide badly needed facilities for 165 pupils. It is now six years later and nothing has been done.
The main reason being given to these people is that the Department is waiting to see what other schools will have to be built in the locality given the expansion of Navan. That should not be a reason to delay the provision of funds for badly needed facilities for the students of this school.
