Rules covering school uniforms, tech and supplies could be increasing costs for parents, warns CCPC

The rules covering uniforms, supplies and technology put in place by many schools could be needlessly increasing costs for parents while harming competition across the education sector, the consumer watchdog has warned.
The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) has written to primary and post-primary schools, outlining a series of recommendations on back-to-school costs.
It is advising schools to use generic uniform items and ensure a competitive process underpins the appointment of any exclusive suppliers for school uniforms, tech devices and software.
The CCPC has also asked schools to consider whether arrangements are likely to restrict competition and increase costs for parents and guardians during the upcoming back-to-school season.
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The recommendations have been made on foot of a CCPC survey of primary and post-primary schools, which revealed 75 per cent have at least one uniform item that must be bought in a recommended retailer.
The research also shows that while 84 per cent of parents support uniforms, almost one-third believe they are not getting good value for money.
A similar percentage said the requirements put in place by their children's schools were 'not fair and reasonable', while 41 per cent told CCPC researchers that they did not believe there was sufficient choice.
'Back to school can be an expensive and stressful time for families. By promoting competition among suppliers, schools can help to reduce costs and deliver good value,' said CCPC spokeswoman Úna Butler.
'By having branded uniforms and exclusive suppliers, schools can unwittingly suppress competition between businesses and
drive up
prices,' she continued.
She said there were 'very simple steps schools can take to create more competitive markets for school supplies, allowing parents to shop around and secure better back-to-school value'.
Ms Butler stressed competition was at its 'most intense when consumers have options, so we recommend that schools appoint multiple suppliers and avoid exclusive suppliers. Where a specific supplier needs to be appointed, schools should regularly review their arrangements to ensure that the supplier is offering the best mix of quality, price, and service to parents and guardians.'
The CCPC also asked schools to make sure they did not increase costs for parents 'by requiring them to buy non-essential products as part of a bundle when they purchase a device'.
The most recent study published by the Irish League of Credit Unions on the impact back-to-school costs have on parents revealed that almost two-thirds describe them as a financial burden, with one in four going into debt to ensure their children will have what they need when schools reopen.
The annual research published last summer put the total back-to-school spend in 2024 at €1,086 per child for primary school parents and €1,401 per child for secondary school parents.

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[ Ireland falls further behind on emissions targets making billions in fines more likely Opens in new window ] Another concern is the pressing need to cut carbon emissions to meet climate targets. The electricity shortage has already led to curbs on power-hungry data centres, which dominate demand, and emergency power generation from non-renewable sources. This is not good for environmental goals set down in law. Research by the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (Ifac) , the official budget watchdog, shows the challenge is stark. 'We found that Ireland's infrastructure is about 25 per cent lower than what you find in other high-income European countries,' says Niall Conroy, acting chief economist. The main areas of deficiency were in housing, healthcare, transport and electricity. Water systems were 'about average' by European standards, but Ireland needs more water services because of high demand from pharmaceutical, information technology and semiconductor industries. 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'Most people would point to a difficulty getting connections to the electricity grid and to water or wastewater facilities,' says Conroy. Ifac's concerns mirror those of authorities such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In a recent report on Ireland, the IMF says 'several key challenges remain in the effective delivery of infrastructure – including planning delays, low construction productivity (including the need to utilise modern methods of construction), and labour shortages in the construction sector'. Video: Dan Dennison The Central Bank has similar anxieties. 'The Irish economy is facing well-documented infrastructure challenges in housing, energy, water and transport, which to be addressed will necessitate a rise in construction sector activity,' the bank said this week as it cut housing delivery forecasts for 2025, 2026 and 2027. This prompts unavoidable questions about conditions on the ground, where builders say the utilities crunch is starting to hinder housing delivery in areas of high demand. 'The LDA [Land Development Agency] is bumping into servicing infrastructure issues in relation to some of its sites, which it's working to overcome with the relevant authorities,' says John Coleman, chief of the LDA, the State body charged with building thousands of homes on public land. A titanic effort is required to boost housing output. But water and wastewater networks are under huge strain already. 'The crunch is here,' says Laffey of Uisce Éireann, adding that capacity is fast running out in Dublin. The national water authority can sustainably produce 618 million litres of water per day in the capital and its hinterland. However, demand over the May public holiday weekend hit 658 million litres. 'So we are running down our reserves of drinking water during the week and we're catching up at the weekend,' says Laffey. The solution for Uisce Éireann lies in a project to bring treated Shannon water to Dublin through a 170km pipeline from the Parteen Basin in Co Tipperary. The authority will seek planning permission at the end of 2025, but Laffey is conscious of the risk of legal challenge. 'In Ireland one person anywhere on the island can take a judicial review,' he says. 'Given the vociferous opposition we have to the pipe in certain areas down in Tipperary, we probably would expect it.' [ Project to pipe water from river Shannon to Dublin could cost €10bn Opens in new window ] The body's wastewater plans have already hit a legal wall. Uisce Éireann went to An Bord Pleanála in 2018 seeking permission for a new Greater Dublin Drainage (GDD) scheme to supplement the major Dublin plant at Ringsend that is near capacity. 'We've seen four years' worth capacity used up in Ringsend in the last 18 months,' says Laffey. Permission for the GDD scheme was granted in 2019 but the High Court quashed it in 2020 after a case taken by a daily sea swimmer. The ruling found the decision 'legally flawed' because the planning board failed to seek certain EPA observations. The matter went back to An Bord Pleanála, with a new decision still awaited. 'We're still in the planning process seven years on and Ringsend is running out of capacity,' Laffey says, warning that Ringsend could reach its limits by 2028. 'Ultimately we either continue and allow the treatment plant to become overloaded to some extent. Or we just stop connections.' The whole of Dublin is dependent on this to be able to flush the toilet in five years — Developer Has Laffey told the Government of this threat to new housing? 'Yes.' How far away is the risk of a halt to housing connections? 'We are saying at the moment that the crunch will come in 2028,' he says, adding that a new GDD planning decision is expected in months but that 'interim measures' will be needed. 'If we don't go to judicial review again, we anticipate that plant will be in place in 2032,' he says. 'We should make it. It will be squeaky.' [ 'Constrained' water supply jeopardises new Dublin suburb with 6,000 planned homes Opens in new window ] Complicating matters further is that project costs have shot up. When the original GDD scheme went to tender, the price was €630 million. Now the estimate is €1.3 billion. 'That cost has increased by €700 million. No one's talking about it,' Laffey says. The LDA faces similar pressure. Coleman told an Oireachtas committee that a Judicial Review against permission for 1,000 homes at the former Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum, Dublin, delayed the plans by two years. This added 'at least €30 million' to the €400 million project cost. So what is the solution to the cycle of delay, disarray and litigation? 'Ireland has created an objection manufacturing facility because the legal system allows for objectors to intervene at a very low level,' says a veteran of court battles. 'The legal threshold for objection is very low.' According to an informed source, one proposal under Government consideration is to cap the legal fees in judicial review cases on critical infrastructure. At present litigants can claim all their legal fees from the State if they successfully challenge an infrastructure project in court. The idea of imposing a cap on such costs, which has yet to be settled definitively, would limit fees to €35,000. With costs in some cases running to hundreds of thousands of euro, the aim would be to reduce the incentive for lawyers to take on judicial review actions on a 'no foal, no fee' basis. A further idea is to fast-track planning and any litigation on designated 'public interest' projects. [ The Irish Times view on infrastructure: stop making the same mistakes Opens in new window ] 'Could we have a policy for public good so that if we put in an application for a wastewater treatment plant it gets treated as a priority?' asks Laffey. 'If it ends up in the courts, it gets treated as a priority. We're not saying that people shouldn't have the right to object. Of course they should. But it should be treated in a way that is accelerated.' Another proposal is to move from the sequential submission of planning and consent papers to a system of parallel submissions made simultaneously, in effect telescoping a process that takes years to complete. More radical still would be measures to exempt the most critical utility projects from planning procedures. This would be highly controversial, certainly. But the risks posed by any failure to finally deliver the GDD project are significant. 'The whole of Dublin is dependent on this to be able to flush the toilet in five years,' says one developer who faces project delays because of constraints on water and power supplies. How grave is the electricity problem? Conroy estimates the network in the Republic is about 25 per cent below comparable European countries. 'In recent years there's been a shortage of generation capacity in the Irish power system,' he says. Niall Conroy, acting chief economist with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council. Photograph: Damien Eagers Industry regulators brought in emergency generation to fill the gap in the short term, but the machines burned fossil fuel. 'Ideally, if we are adding additional electricity generation capacity it should be in renewables.' The pressures on the network have been all too apparent for years. In 2021 national grid manager EirGrid curbed electricity access in Dublin for data centres, buildings that house highly energy-intensive computer systems for storing internet and business data. The next year new data-centre gas connections were stopped. This remains a matter of contention with big US tech groups. While industry figures say the curbs have driven big data-centre projects away from Ireland, ministers have been advised to 'ration' connections for new centres. Such tensions were set out in clear terms a month ago when Oonagh Buckley, secretary general of the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment, spoke at a public meeting about trade-offs between housing needs and the power demands of the growing artificial intelligence (AI) industry. 'We're having to even think about prioritising what is the social need of the demand – is it housing or is it AI?' she said. This reflects the view that it is already a daunting challenge to meet the electricity needs of a growing population, before any discussion on data centres. Central Statistics Office (CSO) data shows total metered consumption of electricity grew 30 per cent between 2015 and 2024, with data centres taking up the overwhelming portion of the growth. Their share of power consumption doubled to 22 per cent in 2024 from 11 per cent in 2020 and more than quadrupled from 5 per cent in 2015. The increased share of demand came despite the addition of almost 204,000 residential meters to the network between 2015 and 2024. Tens of thousands of new homes are required to settle the housing crisis. However, developers on sites with hundreds of homes in certain areas of Dublin have been told electricity connections are not possible without new power substations. Such infrastructure is critical, converting high-voltage electricity from power plants to lower-voltage supply for homes. ESB Networks says single individual homes can be connected within weeks, but new multiphase residential or industrial developments 'could require a very significant amount of new infrastructure' which is then subject to design, planning and procurement lead times. The company cites challenges securing viable sites for substations and requests for connections in areas of limited demand. Other issues include long lead times to procure kit. 'Network reinforcement projects can take a number of years to deliver,' it says. Transport timelines are also measured in years – and the more years that pass, the more costs rise. When Melis Maynar of Madrid met Ahern 22 years ago, the projected costs for the original Dublin underground varied between €3.4 billion and €4.7 billion. Such figures, large as they are, now appear trifling. With MetroLink delivery not likely until some time in the 2030s, the project was costed in a range between €7 billion and €12 billion in 2021. But that was before post-Covid inflation set in. Now there are fears that costs, in the worst-case scenario, could balloon to €23 billion or even more. [ Dublin's Metrolink project could go 40% over budget and leave many homes 'grievously impacted' Opens in new window ] But Walsh of TII says the MetroLink plan is critical for climate targets. 'If there's any hope of decarbonising mobility in Dublin, we absolutely need to build the metro.' If MetroLink happens, the cost will be many multiples of the €1.45 billion Spain spent in the 1990s building 56km of Madrid metro lines in four years. This was helped by 24-hour tunnelling and Melis Maynar's aversion to fancy architecture, and his reluctance to fork out big fees to 'consultants who consult with consultants and advisers who advise advisers'. Without any tunnelling or tracks laid, the State has already paid dearly for metro planning. Spending on MetroLink had reached €181 million by July 2024. When the first metro plan was scrapped in 2011, the State wrote off €225 million of exchequer funding for the scheme. Infrastructure is always expensive but the consequences of failure could be even more costly.