Cathal Crowe

You would hope they wouldn't arise, but they can arise.

There is, unfortunately, economic turbulence again globally.

An awful lot of this has been allocated.

As I said, the spend is 94% higher than it was five years ago.

So it isn't a case of Minister Lawless holding on to money.

Just to respond to that point directly, when the legislation passed last winter in 2025, Minister Lawless was then empowered to use his funds in different ways.

And he has now set up a plan from now out to 2030.

So you will very shortly see most of this divvied up for certain projects.

Well, no, that doesn't represent where an awful lot of this goes.

There's a huge amount of progress.

There's mental work programmes.

There's AI readiness.

There's innovation.

Universities are one of the key places where people upskill anyway.

So this is, I would argue, within the remit of what all of this should belong to.

We are at the cutting edge.

We're number one ranked in terms of skill readiness in the world.

Well, I would respectfully disagree to some extent anyway.

I was a primary school teacher prior to my election to the Dáil.

The classroom infrastructure is as intrinsically linked and critical as the teacher delivering the skill set.