Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I invite the Minister of State to visit Dublin 15, particularly the two schools and the two areas. He made a suggestion originally that, effectively, people would travel to Dún Laoghaire or Sallynoggin. His follow-up suggestions were the Liberties and Ballsbridge, if I heard him correctly. In terms of transport options in Dublin, the fact is a lot of people who have limited transport themselves are unlikely to go somewhere that is up to two hours away from where they live. Often, there is no public transport option that would take them directly. I invite the Minister of State to visit the two schools in Dublin West because the point about these schools is the staff are working very hard to maximise the opportunities of all of the students who attend them and of the adult population in the area, particularly those who have remained in unemployment over a long period, to give them opportunities to get back into education and to go further in education after their leaving certificate and to qualify. Many people would be interested, for instance, in taking up apprenticeships, particularly people coming through education, but there is work to be done on all of this.

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