Results 1-20 of 1,162,396 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Rory O'Hanlon OR speaker:Hildegarde Naughton OR speaker:Robert Troy OR speaker:Fergus O'Dowd OR speaker:Patrick O'Donovan OR speaker:Catherine Connolly OR speaker:Marc Ó Cathasaigh OR speaker:Josepha Madigan OR speaker:Joe O'Brien OR speaker:Niall Collins OR speaker:Paschal Donohoe OR speaker:Paul McAuliffe OR speaker:Jim O'Callaghan OR speaker:Brendan Howlin OR speaker:Jennifer Murnane O'Connor OR speaker:Alan Dillon OR speaker:Maurice Quinlivan OR speaker:Michael Collins OR speaker:Michael Fitzmaurice OR speaker:Michael Healy-Rae OR speaker:Seán Sherlock OR speaker:Gino Kenny OR speaker:Micheál Martin OR speaker:Aindrias Moynihan OR speaker:Noel Grealish OR speaker:Martin Kenny OR speaker:Joan Collins OR speaker:Catherine Murphy OR speaker:Réada Cronin OR speaker:Ossian Smyth OR speaker:Eamon Ryan OR speaker:Mark Ward OR speaker:Catherine Martin OR speaker:Gerald Nash OR speaker:Alan Kelly OR speaker:Brian Stanley OR speaker:Pat Buckley OR speaker:Willie O'Dea OR speaker:Norma Foley OR speaker:Cathal Crowe OR speaker:Cormac Devlin OR speaker:Brendan Smith OR speaker:Malcolm Noonan)

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Apologies have been received from the Cathaoirleach, Deputy Paul Kehoe. I remind members and officials to please ensure mobile phones are switched off for the duration of the meeting as they interfere with broadcasting equipment, even when on silent mode. This meeting has been convened to consider the Supplementary Estimates for Vote 26, education, which has been referred to this committee...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: I thank the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach. I begin by wishing the Chairman a speedy recovery. I am pleased to be here this morning together with officials from my Department. I thank the committee for the opportunity to speak with its members and ask for their consideration of the Department's Supplementary Estimates for 2024. Following approval by the Government, the Department is...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: On school secretaries and caretakers, the Deputy will be aware that all school secretaries who were keen to come onto the payroll of the Department of Education have now signed up and crossed over. They are now automatically paid by the Department of Education as distinct from receiving payment from their school board or through grants received by the board. I gave a commitment that a...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: Yes. As regards school transport, a number of recommendations came out of the review of school transport. A phased implementation of the review has begun, and that includes the pilot projects. We have funding in place to continue the pilot projects and add to them. Our ambition is, as we have outlined previously to this committee, to ensure that by 2030 we will have a further 100,000...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: Mr. Loftus is very keen to cover that one.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: If I might interrupt, officials cannot address select committee meetings. I apologise. I ask the Minister to address the matter.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: I was giving the committee the opportunity to hear from the head of planning and building. The subhead is used to fund school accommodation. This is A15: to buy sites, deliver smaller scale works in schools, provide furniture and equipment and address remediation works. The current allocation subhead provides for grants towards rental of temporary school premises at primary and...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: We are well over time. Does the Deputy want to ask a very short supplementary question?

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: By infrastructure, we mean school buildings, really, specifically the project roll-out of those school buildings. I am very happy to come back-----

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: The Minister might be able to come back to the Deputy with a detailed breakdown.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: Yes, absolutely.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Jim O'Callaghan: I welcome the Minister and her officials before the committee. What appears to be the most significant part of the Supplementary Estimates is the significant additional capital allocation of €517 million in respect of the schools building programme. I very much welcome the significant activity on the part of the programme, not just in my constituency but throughout the country. The...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: We have a forward planning unit within the Department and it is very successful. We now liaise with local authorities, for example, on their future projections. We also gather all the data that is necessary. It is a GIS system. We engage with child benefit and so on. As regards the figures we are talking about here, we have currently 350 projects on the ground at construction, and the...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Jim O'Callaghan: How is the school building unit doing in terms of projects coming in on time and on budget? Sometimes we only hear of capital developments by the State that do not come in on time and on budget, but am I correct in saying very many of them do come in on time and on budget?

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: 100%. We have a very strong record of being on time and on budget. I acknowledge the work of the planning and building unit and am here in the company of Mr. Loftus, but I also acknowledge the work of all those who work with the Department to ensure there is strong delivery.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Jim O'Callaghan: The Minister mentioned already the provision of accommodation for children with special educational needs. I think I am right in saying it is now the case that any new schools being developed will automatically have special educational needs classrooms.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: Yes.

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Jim O'Callaghan: What is the Department's role in trying to facilitate and assist schools that have been there for a longer time and may have difficulty in identifying space for SEN classrooms?

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Norma Foley: In the first instance I want to talk about the National Council for Special Education and how we have expanded it significantly. We made provision in the previous budget for an additional 160 staff and that they would be specifically people who were on the ground, such as the special needs organisers who are engaging directly on the ground with the schools. We also see it now as part of...

Select Committee on Education and Skills: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 26 - Education (Supplementary) (22 Oct 2024)

Jim O'Callaghan: This is not a question but a comment. I am not sure whether the Minister has had an opportunity yet to look at the new school on Harcourt Terrace. Harcourt Terrace Educate Together National School is an absolutely fantastic building. I commend the planning and building unit on it and hope to see the Minister out there shortly so she can see the benefit of the good work being done by her...