Aisling Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank and congratulate the Chair. I was delighted to see his appointment. I know he will bring his energy and enthusiasm to this role as he does to his others. I concur with some of the other contributors who talked about the great strides we have made in education over many years. At its most basic level, we have made it more accessible and affordable through, most recently, free schoolbooks and school meals. I would like to see us continue on with this accessibility work. I would like to see this committee focus on Gaelscoileanna and Educate Together schools and exploring how we can support them more and grow them.

School bus transport was another issue mentioned. That review has been complete for a while now, with only some pilot programmes. We need to see it implemented. As Deputy Coppinger said, though, special education should be our key focus. We have had many new classrooms opened. Among the vast majority of children in my area who have a place for September, some have places that are 20 km or 30 km from their homes. Just providing a place is not good enough. We need to strive for better in that regard.

Turning to the subject of youth, it will be important we meet in this room with youth groups. I know we have a great age and gender profile here but we need to hear from the people we are discussing. These are young people and groups like Youth Work Ireland and others and this should inform some of our work.