EDUCATION Minister Paul Givan has released a lengthy six-page Written Ministerial Statement to address what he's described as "factual inaccuracies" about a £6 million Capital DEL allocation to the Department of Education.
News that just £1 million of the funding has been spent on Irish language projects has unleashed a storm of protest from Irish language activists and educationalists.
In December 2025, £6 million was allocated to the Department of Education by Finance Minister John O'Dowd. The Department of Education applied for the funding for Irish-language accommodation and facilities through Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta.
The money was provided in one of Stormont's monitoring rounds in which unspent money from departments in Stormont is put up for review and reallocated.
However, following the allocation of funds, officials secured Department of Finance approval to use project bank accounts to allow money to be spent elsewhere on existing infrastructure projects for schools. Minister Givan had made a decision that this would be a better use of public funds.
£5 million of the £6 million allocated was spent elsewhere on schools already under construction, with just £1 million allocated to Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta spent on Irish language projects.
Micheál Mac Giolla Ghunna, Principal of Coláiste Feirste, recently addressed Stormont's Education Committee on a lack of choice at A-Level for Irish-medium students because of a shortage of teachers where he said that not enough was being done to meet the needs of pupils.
In his statement, Minister Givan argued that the £6 million allocated in the December monitoring round was not specifically earmarked in the way that critics claim.
"My officials therefore submitted a bid at pace on the basis that Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta had identified longer-term funding requirements and that, crucially, given the late stage of the financial year, it could, as a third-party organisation, operating a trust fund, utilise end-year flexibility in managing the funding," the statement reads.
"While I was aware of the funding pressures facing Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta, I considered it appropriate to balance these against competing demands. Iontaobhas na Gaelscolaíochta is not an Arm's Length Body of my Department and the funding in question was not intended to be utilised immediately on projects that were shovel-ready or contractually committed."
Sinn Féin MLA Pat Sheehan challenged the Minister on this decision.
"The Department of Education bid for £6 million specifically for Irish-medium accommodation and facilities. The Finance Minister announced that allocation to the Assembly and Paul Givan has since confirmed those are the circumstances in which the funding was received.
"There is no ambiguity. The funding was sought and allocated for a specific purpose. Yet the Minister chose to divert £5 million elsewhere.
"Paul Givan now has serious questions to answer about the basis on which he believes he could redirect funding that had been approved following a bid for Irish-medium accommodation and facilities.
"Given his well-documented record of hostility towards the Irish language, many in the Irish-medium sector will understandably question whether this was a political decision rather than a financial one."
Minister Givan claims that he is committed to supporting Irish medium education.
"I remain committed to supporting Irish medium education within the resources available to my Department and in the context of competing statutory and budgetary priorities."
In 2016, Mr Givan – in his role as Minister for Communities – cut funding to the Líofa bursary scheme, which had been set up by Sinn Féin's Carál Ní Chuilín to enable young people to attend summer colleges in the Gaeltacht. The decision resulted in one of the most explosive political controversies of recent decades and was credited as a key reason for Sinn Féin's collapsing of the political institutions a month later.
