Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 16 December 2025
471. Deputy Marie Sherlock asked the Minister for Education and Youth the status of the masterplan for the Whitehall campus on the Swords Road, Dublin 9, the status of a school building project (details supplied); the expected timeline for completion; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [71966/25]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe major building project referred to by the Deputy will be delivered as part a shared educational campus which will provide 2 new 1,000 pupil post primary schools each with 6 classrooms for children with special education needs, a new 8 classroom primary school with accommodation and 2 classrooms for children with special education needs and a new 20 classroom special school at the Swords Road campus in Whitehall.
The project is being delivered under my Department's ADAPT 4 Programme – Programme Innovate. This programme is led by Integrated Project Teams consisting of highly skilled and experienced design professionals, architects, engineers, project managers, quantity surveyors and various other consultants to deliver the projects.
The project is currently at the initial stage of architectural planning – Stage 1, where a site and current building assessment is carried out, and initial design sketch schemes are created. The IPT currently estimate submission of their Stage 1 report to my Department late in Q4 2025, and upon review, the Stage 1 stakeholders meeting to be arranged during Q1 2026.
Until all statutory approvals have been secured, it will not be possible to estimate the timeline for this project to construction and completion.
In July the Government announced a capital allocation of €7.55 billion for the Department of Education and Youth for the period 2026-2030 under the National Development Plan. As part of this NDP allocation my department will place a strong emphasis on provision for children with special educational needs, with a particular focus on meeting annual school place needs. In relation to project rollout for Large-Scale projects and Additional School Accommodation scheme projects, the approach will be to continue to maximise the capacity of the existing school estate as much as possible in the first instance and provide necessary additional capacity through targeted and prioritised project rollout over the course of 2026 to 2030 period to meet the most urgent and prioritised needs.
Government departments are currently in the process of publishing their sectoral NDP Implementation Plans. The sectoral plan for the Education and Youth sector will be published next week and the first tranche of projects to progress to construction will be published in January. This NDP Implementation Plan will optimise outputs from the NDP allocations, with a strong focus on maximising existing school capacity, progressing priority projects where local capacity across schools in the area is insufficient, and ensuring delivery that is affordable, offers value for money, and meets functional needs.
