Report says toilets in school are leaking

A report by the Health and Safety Authority on a Co Kerry school which is at the centre of a controversy over rats has detailed…

A report by the Health and Safety Authority on a Co Kerry school which is at the centre of a controversy over rats has detailed its poor state of repair.

The report said one of the classrooms, the third-year room, in Meanscoil an Leith-Triuigh, in Cloghane, was not attached to the floor. Electrical fittings were in a dangerous state, with conductors exposed.

The two toilets were leaking and in a poor state, and teachers said many of the 78 students in the school were refusing to use them.

Inspectors from the Southern Health Board have also visited the school this week, and they are to report to the Department of Education shortly.

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Yesterday, some 100 parents and the pupils of the non-exam classes staged a protest at the school.

Last week, the principal, Mr Ciaran Begley, said he had no way of keeping rats out of the old prefabs, and putting down poison was no use.

He offered to provide 19 witnesses to the appearance of a large rat during a pre-Leaving Cert and pre-Junior exam.

He was responding to comments in the Dáil by Mr Dempsey, the Minister for Education, that he could not accept rats or mice should be in a school.

Mr Dempsey also said while he was aware of the serious condition of the school, a proposed new building was at an advanced stage of architectural planning.

Parents have been waiting for a new school for some years. They now want emergency accommodation until the new school is provided.

The mixed school is the only secondary school in the northern part of the Dingle Peninsula, and serves the area around Brandon and Castlegregory.