Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation
Dail Éireann — 2026-03-26
============================================================

Paul Donnelly (SF), Dublin West

Next weekend, many of us will be at the 1916 Easter commemorations honouring those who fought and died for Irish freedom. The Proclamation references "cherishing all the children of the nation equally". Just last week, I met the local management committee for school completion at Blakestown Community School. Like all school completion committees, it works with the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children in our communities. It has not had an increase in funding in years, with larger numbers of students leading to effective cuts every year. Yesterday, the Government announced the DEIS plus scheme, a new set of additional plans and funding for schools in very disadvantaged communities. The feedback I have got from schools is one of utter shock and dismay. One school has been selected for DEIS plus for the entire Dublin 15 area. Rath Dara Community College is a post-primary school that is a stone's throw away from the only primary school that was selected, Ladyswell National School, but it is not on the list. Blakestown Community School and Scoil Mhuire, which are both DEIS schools, did not make it. Is this just a box-ticking exercise to claim the Government is doing something for disadvantaged students? If not, will the Minister commit to revisiting the allocation? At the end of the day, it is not just Dublin 15. There are communities all over that are absolutely baffled as to how their local schools were not selected for DEIS plus.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-03-26/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:47+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-26