'Teething problems' behind schools' underspend
Thursday, 5 November 2009 16:26A senior official at the Department of Education has blamed 'teething problems' related to changes in how building contracts are awarded for delays in spending money allocated for new school buildings.
Assistant General Secretary at the department Frank Wyse told an Oireachtas Committee the fact that tender prices were coming in 30% lower than at the height of the boom was also a significant factor.
Last month RTÉ News revealed how the Department of Education was falling behind in spending on much needed building projects.
By the end of September its capital spend was 20% or €112m behind what it should have been, a shortfall seen in no other big spending department.
Since then that gap has grown even further to €140m.
Today Assistant General Secretary Frank Wyse told the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Education that a new public works contract, now mandatory across the public sector, had created delays in progressing building projects.
However, he said he believed these delays would reduce in coming months as the industry became used to the new procedures.
Outlining the scale of the demand for new school buildings Mr Wyse said births had increased by 37% between 2000 and 2008 and that means an additional 90,000 primary school pupils in the system over the next 10 years.
