The State has been urged to consider buying a listed building in Co Laois which is to be sold by the Patrician Brothers, who can no longer afford its upkeep.
The building, Ballyfin House, is an early 19th-century dwelling on 600 acres of parkland in the foothills of the Slieve Bloom mountains. It is adjacent to a former boarding school, Ballyfin College, which is to close.
The Patrician Brothers announced their intention to close the school last week, citing falling vocations and rising maintenance costs as the basis for their decision. The entire estate is to be sold.
Students attending the college will move to a community school to be built in nearby Portlaoise. The school, which will accommodate the town's vocational school pupils, will be owned by Co Laois VEC. It is expected to be built within three years.
A local Fine Gael TD, Mr Charles Flanagan, has urged the State to buy Ballyfin estate, saying it would make an ideal rural park. "Ballyfin estate is a major tourist and heritage attraction for the midlands. It would be a shame for the State to let this opportunity pass and I hope that Ballyfin House will remain open to the public for the future," he said.
"I have been in touch with the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands, Ms de Valera, requesting that the State enter into immediate negotiations with the Patrician Brothers for the purchase by the State of Ballyfin," he added.
He said Ballyfin House was one of the finest Victorian buildings in the midlands and was "an architectural gem".
It was originally the seat of the Hon William WellesleyPole, a brother of the Duke of Wellington. Wellesley-Pole became Chief Secretary for Ireland and Chancellor of the Irish Exchequer.
In 1812 he sold the house to Sir Charles Coote who commissioned plans for the rebuilding of the house. As it now stands, it was described by Mr Edward McParland of Trinity College Dublin's history of art department, as Ireland's grandest neoclassical house.
Including a Richard Turner conservatory, it was bought by the Patrician Brothers for £10,000 in the late 1920s.
A Minister of State, Mr Willie O'Dea, a former student of Ballyfin College, said he was saddened to hear of the school's impending closure. "It's an institution and I would support Deputy Flanagan's belief that it should be preserved. I will talk to Minister de Valera personally about it," he said.
Mr O'Dea attended the college from 1965 to 1970 and has mixed memories of his time there. "There was a big emphasis on discipline and a certain culture of survival of the fittest. But certainly it was a tremendous training ground for life. It taught one how to survive and fight one's corner."
The principal of Ballyfin College, Brother Matthew Hayes, said he would have no objection to the State buying the property. "I'd nearly prefer if it did rather than a private business coming in," he said.
He expressed disappointment that the college, which opened in 1929 and has more than 500 students, had to close. "While it's quite difficult to face, every one of us knew that sooner or later changes of a drastic nature would have to be made," he said.
He said falling vocations and the brothers' lack of resources to maintain the property precipitated the changes. There are four Patrician brothers in Ballyfin House and two on the college teaching staff. Only one person had joined the order in the past 30 years, he confirmed.
A spokesperson for the Department of Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands confirmed the Department had been approached to take the house into State ownership and the matter was under consideration.
"It would have to be considered in the context of its historical and architectural significance and also in terms of what future use could be made of it," he said.
"We do take some properties into State care in exceptional circumstances. At the moment we have ownership of over 750 monuments and any available funding is being used for the care of these," he added.