Hundreds to protest over funding delays for school

DISHEARTENED children have inspired parents and teachers to have a street demonstration over delays in funding for a new school.

Several hundred people will protest in Clonmel next week over the failure of the Government to fund a new school building. Gaelscoil Chluain Meala has been based in rented accommodation for 13 years and a campaign has been continuing, in recent months, to secure funding.

However, with no Government commitment forthcoming, campaigners have decided to march next Monday to highlight the plight of the Gaelscoil and its 200 pupils.

“The parents are so frustrated by the whole thing that this is their suggestion,” said Gaelscoil principal Treasa Nic Dhiarmada.

In 2001, the school was told by the then Education Minister Michael Woods that a new school would be built, “within a couple of years”, but, today, the project is still going through the Department of Education and Science.

A link with a new Clonmel campus for the Tipperary Institute outside the town has been explored for the Gaelscoil but remained no nearer to resolution, according to Ms Nic Dhiarmada.

“(Education Minister) Mary Hanafin was in Tipperary recently but didn’t come to see us. I got about 30 seconds to speak to her at the gate of another school. She just keeps saying that it’s being processed in the department and with the Tipperary Institute.”

Pupils recently collected signatures from registered voters within their own families and thousands ended up signing the petition.

South Tipperary County Council have been fully behind the new school proposal, according to the principal: “It was built in 1830 and the parents have collected a huge amount of money to make it comfortable, but it’s an old building and carries all the problems associated with a building of such an age.”

The parents also have to raise funds to pay 5% of the annual rent and to cover maintenance which isn’t paid for by the school’s capital grant.