Ms Lorraine Dempsey:

I wish to add a point on the transport issue for students with special educational needs. There is a divergence in planning. Some areas have recognised that having pupils from two special schools sharing one bus leads to the potential risk of two school closures if there is an outbreak and have managed to adjust the routes separating those two school buses. There is a particular issue in rural areas in getting taxi support where no actual bus route is in place and where they cannot get a taxi to serve that route, which leaves the parent having to bring that child significant distances to school. We are not talking about half an hour. We are talking about 100 km or more in some instances. They have been well documented in previous committee meetings. Parents are concerned about the social distancing particularly with the cohort on the special school transport who in the main cannot wear any form of face covering, leaving them more open to risk.

As Ms Lynch mentioned earlier, children going to school may not necessarily be on the same special school transport vehicle on the way back, which mixes it all up again. When trying to reduce the risk of transmissibility it is a challenge for parents to see how that will work.