Education Minister Ruairi Quinn has today apologised to the children and parents at a Dublin school which has not been able to afford to fix its boiler for five weeks.
Principal of Our Lady of the Wayside National School in Bluebell Anne McCluskey revealed this morning that they do not have the €300 necessary for the repairs.
Her staff have been texting parents suggesting they put extra layers of clothes on their children to keep them warm during the school day.
Minister Ruairi Quinn says the school should be able to access funding for these kind of necessary works and he says it is not acceptable that parents are facing requests to dress their children to cope with the cold indoors.
"No it's not quite frankly - and I'm going to make direct inquiries into the indiviudal case," he said.
"If a boiler breaks down I know that there is a response capable of being delivered, and I will undertake to make a direct inquiry".
"And I'm sorry that the children and the parents have had to go through this experience."