Ms Miriam Kenny:

For autistic children, depending on their needs, they can do very well within a mainstream setting as long as they are properly supported, which is important. There is a cohort of children who need the additional support of a special class, and my son was one of those children. He had been in a mainstream setting and was well supported but, unfortunately, he could not manage in that setting. There is also special school provision for children who need to be supported in a particular way.

Travelling a long distance to school is not an appropriate school placement, and we have spoken to people in education about this. Anxiety is caused to children when they are put into a taxi or onto a bus for the long term. We may hear from some parents that their child actually likes that journey but others will say otherwise. In Dublin traffic, the journey might not be far but it is long because of the nature of that. Moreover, parents often talk about the difficulty they have in getting transport and so on. Travelling long distances to school is not appropriate. When the rest of a community is walking by the parent to the local school and that parent and his or her child are not a part of the community, that is not an appropriate education for the child.

The anxiety issue is significant for a number of children. We have a comment from one parent we might read out.