Pupils at a Wexford Gaelscoil are to be withdrawn from classes today in protest at the Department of Education's failure to provide a new school building.
There is no staffroom, no office space, no hot water in the boys' toilets and, they claim, inadequate recreation space. In any event, they must vacate the premises when the current school year ends in the summer.
The Department of Education and Science has offered temporary accommodation until a new school is built by late 2003 at the earliest, but this is unacceptable to parents and staff.
Mr Peader Maxwell, spokesman for the Scoil Charman Action Committee, which organised today's protest, said the Department had promised that a new school would be open in September.
A site, adjacent to the existing premises at Bishopswater in Wexford town, had been purchased and planning permission obtained. All that was required now was for the Department to sanction the final stages of the process and allow building of the school, which was expected to cost €1.65 million (£1.3 million), to start.
The sports club that owned the existing premises had been very patient with the school but had obtained planning permission to carry out development work and was anxious to get this started. "We have nowhere to go in September, but we're not going to give up and we're not going to go away," he said.
A campaign in support of the school has been gathering momentum in Wexford, and stickers with the message, "Tóg Scoil Charman Anois!" ("Build Scoil Charman Now!") can be seen around the town.
Parents planned to stage a protest outside the school today, said Mr Maxwell, but the decision to withdraw children was a voluntary one and classes would go ahead for pupils who attended.
A large majority of parents, however, were expected to support the action.
In a statement to The Irish Times, the Department of Education and Science said Scoil Charman was one of 450 major primary school building projects at various stages of architectural planning.
The school, it said, had received permanent recognition in January 1996. At the time it had been clearly pointed out that, pending the provision of permanent accommodation by the Department, it was the responsibility of the school authorities to provide interim temporary accommodation.
Its purchase of a four-acre site for the school last July was a clear indication of the Department's commitment to proceeding with a permanent building.
"Based on the current status of the design of the school, the most optimum position allowing for the time required for the invitation of tenders and placing contracts and site preparation is that a new school would be ready for occupation in late 2003," said the statement.
"In the interim, the Department is prepared to put temporary accommodation on site immediately if for any reason the school has to vacate the premises it selected when granted recognition."
Mr Maxwell, whose six-year- old daughter, Aoibheann, attends the school, said temporary accommodation would be a waste of money and might lead to the entire project being long-fingered.
"It's a half-measure. The children have put up with a bad state of affairs for long enough and to compromise would be unfair to them," he said.
