School has ‘rats, leaks, rotten floors’

CHILDREN in a national school in Galway are being taught in a 109-year-old, crumbling, rat-infested building, it was claimed yesterday.

Parents of children in Eglish National School in Ballinasloe expressed outrage that their children are being taught in a building more than a century old and which is in very dangerous condition.

In a statement issued yesterday, the Parents’ Association of the school highlighted a litany of problems with the school building, ranging from rats, mice, a rotten roof, rotten floors and leaking plumbing.

“There are rats on the outside and we now have mice on the inside. We have a Rentokil report stating that rodents are chewing wires. This is a fire hazard, and with the windows nailed shut it is a tragedy waiting to happen,” said the statement.

The association said it had issued numerous engineer’s reports to the Department of Education listing the structural cracks in the walls, problems with the wiring and the windows, damp, mould, a rotten roof, rotten floors and leaking plumbing.

The parents claim the building is “a health hazard to our children”, that many of them come out in hives due to the lack of ventilation in the classrooms, and constantly come home from school with headaches.

“Ten children have asthma, which is aggravated by the mould and damp. One child fell into a bucket catching rainwater in one of the classrooms. Children are constantly slipping on wet floors. There is no hot water and no heating in the toilets. Part of the storage heating has had to be shut off because the classroom was filling with smoke,” said the Parents’ Association.

The Department of Education has so far given the school €26,862 to renovate the school.

According to parents, this was spent putting tar felt onto the rotting roof to prevent slates falling into the playground.

This money also enabled toilets to be replaced.

Wire mesh was fitted to the inside of windows of the main building to prevent glass from blowing in on top of children.

Leaks to the roof and windows in the prefabs were also repaired.

However, the Parent’s Association said the repairs are nowhere near enough to solve the numerous problems at the school.

“The department seem to think that a few repairs here and there will make this a fit building for our children to be in. It is not,” said the association.

A spokesman for Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe said it received an application for capital funding for a new school building for the first time in April of this year but that it was not possible to give a timeframe on when the application would be processed.