Aisling Dolan (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

My question is about the importance of local transport which the Minister mentioned at the start of his opening statement. In the SUSI scheme, the Minister expanded the radius from 30 km to 45 km or perhaps more. That is crucial for rural areas. How does the Department link in with LocalLink? For example, I am fighting for a bus route between Athlone and Ballinasloe - a LocalLink service that would bring students into the TUS in Athlone. That cannot happen without a bus going regularly on that route. Perhaps the Minister could come back to me on that.