13 December 2007 Edition
Call for Government to resource Gaelscoil Portlaoise
Following a visit to the Gaelscoil, Doherty said:
“The school’s classrooms are made up of eight prefabs and this has been the case for the last nine years. To add insult to injury, the rent for prefabs and land is €180,000 per annum, all of which is paid to private companies. This amount is set to increase. The school has no physical education, library or computer facilities.”
A permanent site with fully resourced school buildings is urgently needed. The existing prefabs are overcrowded, and 40 families have expressed an interest in enrolling their children in the school in the next school term but will have to be turned away unless conditions change.
“Access to full resourced educational facilities in a country like Ireland should not be a privilege, it must become a right. It is a shameful indictment of this government that any of the nation’s children continue to be taught in prefabs.”
Local Sinn Féin Councillor Brian Stanley has continued to raise the deplorable conditions of the school at VEC and council level. Sinn Féin will raise the matter with Education Minister Mary Hanafin in the Dáil, Pearse Doherty said.