School with debt of €500k got €6m in grants

The Waterford secondary school that built up €500,000 in debts, mostly on refurbishments, got over €6m in Department of Education capital grants since 2000.

The funding includes over €900,000 paid from 2004 to last year and €723,000 since 2006 to De La Salle College, which has had to take out a loan guaranteed by its trustees, Le Chéile Schools Trust, to pay off the debts. The loan is costing about €7,000 a month.

The costly works of recent years were described by department inspectors in a damning report this week as having little educational benefit.