Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 5 February 2026
228. Deputy Eoghan Kenny asked the Minister for Education and Youth the number of schools not included, but that have applied, in the NDP announcement that included provision for SEN, in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [8813/26]
View answerAs the Deputy will be aware, I have recently published the €7.55 billion NDP Sectoral Investment Plan for the Education and Youth Sectors for the period 2026 to 2030. This NDP Sectoral Plan involves a very strong emphasis on maximising existing capacity and prioritisation of school building projects to meet the most urgent needs. In this regard there will be a strong special education dimension to project roll-out.
Of the total €7.55 billion investment it is envisaged that circa. €5 billion will be used for project roll-out to support the delivery and modernisation of school buildings across the Large Scale, Additional Accommodation, Modular, and Annual September Accommodation Needs programmes. Over the course of 2026 and 2027 there will be construction work at circa. 10% of the school estate. These projects will, when completed, provide circa 57,000 additional and modernised school places with a strong SEN focus in all projects.
My department will continue to build on the progress made over recent years with the continued roll-out of projects on a prioritised basis to meet the most urgent needs in terms of provision of additional capacity and modernisation of existing facilities. In this regard, I have also published a list of the 105 school building projects in the first tranche to proceed to construction or tender over 2026 and 2027.
The first tranche of 105 school building projects includes 80 large scale and Additional School Accommodation scheme projects. These projects were prioritised with a strong focus on maximising existing capacity and prioritising project roll-out to meet the most urgent needs particularly to support special education needs provision.
Firstly, to facilitate the 45 projects that are currently already at tender stage (Stage 3) so that they can progress to construction as smoothly as possible over the course of 2026 and 2027. Secondly, to facilitate 35 projects that currently have planning permission and are at pre-tender stage (Stage 2b) and have been prioritised to meet urgent requirements from a special needs perspective or to provide additional capacity to cater for demographics or to address very significant condition issues at the schools.
I recognise that there are schools with important building projects that are not included in the first tranche of prioritised projects.
As part of planning ahead for the next tranche of projects to progress to tender, the department-led prioritisation process will continue over the course of 2026 and 2027 to assess and evaluate the progression of individual projects through the design pipeline having regard to the continual need to maximise existing capacity and determine the prioritised needs going forward. This process will involve engagement with key stakeholders and individual schools and will ultimately inform the next tranches of programme roll-out to tender. The department-led Energy and Condition Survey of the school estate, which will be finalised later in 2026, will provide an additional evidence base for assessing priorities.
The current status of all projects, including completions, is set out under item number ten at the following link (www.gov.ie). This is updated on a regular basis to reflect project progress through the various stages of capital appraisal, site acquisition, design, tender and construction. All Large Scale projects have SEN accommodation as part of their delivery and the Additional Accommodation Scheme projects list includes information on the SEN elements delivered as part of their design brief.
As set out in the NDP Implementation Plan the DEY is planning for the provision of at least 2,000 additional special classes across 2026-2030. The specific accommodation solutions for these classes will be worked through at local level, however, it is expected that the majority of special classes will be facilitated in repurposed available accommodation. As part of the Department’s policy of maximising existing capacity, 80% of the new special classes for the 2025/2026 school year were provided through the repurposing of existing available classroom accommodation. All schools opening new special classes are provided with an initial start-up grant of €30,000 and further funding of up to €70,000 is provided to schools that required re-purposing works to be done. The SEN repurposing scheme provides a good mechanism for schools to make provision for special classes with streamlined funding arrangements as outlined in Circular 0039/2025.
