Housing Minister O'Brien ensures adequate school spaces will follow new housing projects

Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien said that he would ensure required school spaces would follow the official opening of 143 new social homes during a visit to Portlaoise today.

The Minister launched the homes in the Meadows on Mountrath Road, Portlaoise, one of the many new housing sites across the town. The new figure includes 28 Cost Rental homes, which were delivered by Clúid Housing in partnership with Laois County Council, the Department for Housing and the Housing Finance Agency.

Addressing concerns about the capacity for local service regarding the rising population, O'Brien said "we will talk regularly to the Department of Transport and indeed to the Department of Education to ensure that we have the required school places".

"It's great to see the new developments here, but we're not just building homes. We've got to build communities, and communities come with with the infrastructure that's needed, the amenities that that's needed, such as in transport and also in education.

"It's been a very impressive delivery so far. We want to go further and build on that, which is what we intend to do this year."

Concerns have been raised about capacity in schools across Portlaoise in the past year, but Laois TD and Minister of State Seán Fleming added that the numbers in primary school in Portlaoise are "manageable at the moment", saying "the population is moving on to secondary school".

"We have given the LOETB (Laois Offaly Education and Training Board) full sanction for a new secondary school here in the town for 1000 pupils, and we're waiting for construction to start so that is coming downstream," Fleming said.

"We've also done big investment in some of the special schools, we have a brand new St. Francis school open. We have a number of school projects actually on stream and coming on through the next month."

The Housing Minister also said he expects the Government to exceed the number of homes built in 2024 to exceed last year's figures. Over 750 residential units were delivered to Laois in 2023, according to the CSO.

Nationally, the coalition has outlined a target of 34,500 homes this year, which it says it's on track to meet or potentially exceed. Construction started on almost 12,000 new homes nationally in the first three months.