Parents of pupils at Holy Family National School, Ardmore Road, Mullingar protest at Westmeath County Council HQ last Monday
This morning.
Mullingar, County Westmeath.
Cathy McGann writes:
You featured our Still No School campaign back in July [when completion of the new Holy Family (Curraghmore) National School was pushed back again]
Work started on this build in Sep 2017 as a 12 month contract. We are now on our 8th missed completion date for this school building and it still looks very unlikely that the 9th October date will also be missed.
I just wanted to send on an update since parents turned out in numbers to protest at the consistent delays to complete this school building.
Monday was the first day of school for 3 junior infant classes and as a direct result of the building delays all 3 classes are now in 3 different locations.
This includes 12 ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) pupils who are now required to travel up to 1.5 hrs on a bus every morning to get to a classroom in Kinnegad, not Mullingar.
Another class is housed in a local GAA Clubhouse and the final class on the existing school site which is made up of overcrowded, prefab buildings which are unfit for purpose.
There is a huge Health and Safety Concern for the 276 students housed on the current site between mould on the walls, frogs being caught in toilets and water so cold in the winter kids don’t want to wash their hands.
There are 3 parties involved in the issue including the Department of Education, Westmeath County Council as project managers and the contractor. It’s a case of too many cooks.
All are blaming each other and meanwhile there are no resources on site and parents are being given no commitment on completion dates and no satisfactory answers to questions.
Parents are now utterly frustrated and we plan to continue with a strong campaign to get this building delivered.
Watch this space….
Previously: Meanwhile, In Mullingar
