Bank of Ireland finances Schools PPP projects – 2009

Bank of Ireland Corporate Banking today (12 March 2009) announces its role as Lender to the four-schools PPP project in Laois and Offaly for which An Taoiseach turned the first sod in Banagher, Co Offaly this morning. Bank of Ireland was the sole Mandated Lead Arranger for the project which is the first in a series of Schools projects to be rolled out under the Department of Education’s Public Private Partnership (PPP) programme.

Bank of Ireland has arranged the project financing package which will finance the construction of the four schools and the maintenance of them over a 25 year period. The construction of the four secondary schools will result in up to 600 jobs and, when complete, will create 2,700 new school places.

Donal Murphy, Director, Global Project Finance at Bank of Ireland said: “The provision of the entire debt funding for the project highlights our continued commitment to the domestic PPP market. This represents the first in a number of schools PPPs and Bank of Ireland is actively supporting bidders for the subsequent projects. The Bank is also supporting bidders across a range of other sectors and projects including education, accommodation, rail and road PPPs. We are fully committed to supporting current and future Irish infrastructure projects being promoted by Government Departments and State Agencies.

“There is no doubt that the financing of PPPs both here and internationally has been impacted in recent months by the global credit crunch. Today’s announcement on the Schools PPP project is a very positive development for the PPP market as it is the first Irish PPP project to close in these more challenging times”, added Donal Murphy.

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