School buildings delay 'unacceptable'

THE BISHOP of Killaloe, Dr Willie Walsh said it is “unacceptable” that the provision of permanent accommodation for Ennis schools should be put on hold any longer.

Dr Walsh made his statement yesterday ahead of parents withdrawing 600 primary school children from Ennis National School tomorrow and marching in protest at the department’s failure to fund a new school.

The school has 16 prefabs and was last week likened to a “concentration camp” by Fine Gael TD Pat Breen.

Dr Walsh, patron of Ennis National School and the town’s other schools, said “not a single extra permanent classroom has been funded and put in place by the Department of Education at Ennis CBS, Scoil Chríost Rí and Ennis National School since the early 1980s”.

Dr Walsh said he shared “the deep disappointment and frustration of boards of management, staff and parents being expressed at the lack of progress in providing adequate permanent accommodation for the Ennis parish primary schools”.

Dr Walsh said the Department of Education recognised in 1999 that the then accommodation for the primary schools was inadequate and urged Minister for Education Batt O’Keeffe to give his urgent attention to the situation.

Dr Walsh said it is over 10 years since his office, along with the joint Catholic trustees of the Ennis parish engaged with the department to provide new permanent accommodation for Ennis schools.

He said: “However, after 10 years it is very regrettable that to date all that has been provided from the 1999 plan of the DES is the refurbishment of Holy Family schools.

“All of the boards, staffs and pupils in three parish primary schools have been trying to cope with a combination of inadequate permanent accommodation and a multiplicity of temporary Porta-cabin accommodation for several years.

“As well as being unsatisfactory this situation is also posing health and safety issues at each of the three schools. Despite the efforts of school management to cater for this difficult situation, it now appears that even the application for grant aid towards the provision of additional necessary temporary accommodation is being refused.

Dr Walsh also pointed out that in 2007, the Department of Education gave approval for the relocation of Ennis National School to a new site being provided on diocesan lands at Ashline, Ennis, and requested that the school size be increased from 24 mainstream classes to accommodate 32 mainstream classes.