Budget 2026: Schools have a funding shortage and the price of everything is rising

Colm Ó’Suilleabháin, principal of St Oliver’s Primary School in Killarney. The school has upwards of 650 students, and costs about €50,000 a month to run. Picture: Valerie O’Sullivan

When teachers at St Oliver’s primary school in Killarney need to replace basic items in their classroom, they approach their school principal Colm Ó’Suilleabháin “almost half apologising”.

“They are nearly apologising to you,” Mr Ó’Suilleabháin explained. 

“Saying ‘I know things are bad, but there’s a blind in my room I can’t fix’ or they’ll bring a laptop that’s falling apart and say ‘I know we have no money, but it's really on the blink, can I get a refurb?’.

The primary school has upwards of 600 students, eight special classes, and more than 100 staff, including teachers, SNAs, and ancillary staff.

“Running a school of this size is expensive,” Mr Ó’Suilleabháin said.

“You are talking about an average of close to €50,000 a month to run our school. That’s everything, between wages and bills. It's huge and the funding does not reflect that.”

Having been principal of the school since 2008, he believes it's never been more difficult financially than now.

“Obviously with the crash, things were bad but I suppose the difference between then and now is that when the crash happened, and the funding was cut, prices came down.

At the moment, we have a funding shortage and a funding crisis, and the price of everything is going up.

The cost of heating the school is “incredible”, he said. 

“That’s the biggest difference in the last couple of years, the cost of everything has gone up: insurance, IT management, replacing IT hardware.”

“I have over 60 teachers in my school and they are coming to me with laptops that are falling apart after ten years, looking to be replaced. Every laptop is close to €700 and the IT grants don’t stretch that far.” 

Capitation grants, the funding paid by the Department of Education to schools towards running costs, such as heating, electricity, and insurance, are paid at different rates for primary schools versus post-primary schools.

While Budget 2026 includes an increase of the standard rate paid per primary school student of €50, it remains much lower at €274 per pupil compared to €406 at post-primary.

This is a longstanding bugbear of primary schools, Mr Ó’Suilleabháin said, calling for the capitation grants to be equalised.

“I don’t understand why they’d be less. The cost of heating a primary school is the same as a post-primary school.”