“It knocks all parents’ confidence that the schools to which they entrust their children are safe – safe for staff and safe for children. The Minister must reassure staff and parents that the schools are indeed safe to open.”
South Dublin County Councillor Carly Bailey, who is a parent of children in one of the affected schools, called on the Minister for Education to publish the inspection reports on the 17 schools that have been newly identified as requiring permanent remediation works.
“It is astonishing that we are finding out at this late stage, two weeks before schools reopen, that yet more schools need temporary and then permanent remediation works.
“It knocks all parents’ confidence that the schools to which they entrust their children are safe – safe for staff and safe for children. The Minister must reassure staff and parents that the affected schools are indeed safe to open.
“I call on the Minister to publish the full engineers reports on these 17 defective schools, and on all the other schools identified as being defective, along with the fire safety audits for each of the schools. We need full transparency on this issue.
“The Minister should also state publicly who will be doing the remediation work for these schools and how that work will be overseen to ensure that it permanently rectifies the problems in each school.
There is a further critical issue about the ‘design and build’ model for schools and the oversight and inspection of all construction.
“It beggars belief that the school which my children attend was completed and opened in 2017, apparently under new building regulations, and has now failed an inspection. There are serious questions to ask about how and when building and fire inspections were carried out during the build and before it was handed over to the school patron. The Minister needs to address these question urgently.”
ENDS
15th August 2019