Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I raise the issue of capacity for secondary school students in Shannon town. The Taoiseach visited one of the secondary schools there with me two years ago, namely, St. Caimin's Community School. The other school is Shannon comprehensive.

As we come out of Covid, there is a need for the post-primary buildings unit to take a comprehensive look at both schools. St. Caimin's was built with an enrolment capacity of 600. It is far exceeding that, yet Department officials fail to recognise the growth of the town and the wide hinterland it encompasses.

Shannon comprehensive is a much older school dating to the 1960s or 1970s, but some of the buildings are crumbling. I fear some of the concrete work may have pyrite in it. The buildings unit will urgently have to come to the town and look at the capacity it has and at the deficient buildings. There needs to be a comprehensive look at how this town, Ireland's newest town in the 1960s but now ageing, can meet its current needs. It needs an urgent re-examination.

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