New libraries to create hundreds of building jobs

HUNDREDS of construction jobs are expected to be created with the building of three new libraries in the University of Limerick as well as Cork and Limerick Institutes of Technology.

A digital media centre, workshop and multi-purpose hall have also been promised for the Dún Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Dublin under a multi-million development boost for third level.

The projects are finally going to tender almost four years after they were originally announced.

Building is expected to begin later this year and the facilities, which will benefit over 5,000 students, will be completed by the end of 2012.

They will be built under a Public Private Partnership (PPP) scheme which the Department of Education will put on the market next week. Under the model, a private company agrees to finance and build a facility, and then maintains and manages it for 25 years, providing services such as cleaning and security during that period.

In return, the Government will pay the company a fixed sum each year for the duration of the contract.

Education Minister, Batt O’Keeffe, said the Government considers the projects “strategically important investments for the smart economy” and they “will create hundreds of jobs in construction at a challenging time for the sector”.

The PPP projects for the third-level sector were originally promised in 2005 by then education minister Mary Hanafin.

A second round of projects, including engineering and catering buildings in Waterford and Tallaght Institutes of Technology will go out for tender later in the year.

A third bundle of PPP projects will include maths, science and computer facilities at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth; a new teaching research wing for Carlow Institute of Technology and an engineering school will be built in Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology.

A date for these PPP projects has not yet been set.