Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate that the Minister has said the Minister of State, Deputy Halligan, is open to engagement. He certainly has not been open to engagement thus far in respect of these three villages. The parents concerned will testify to that. If he is willing to meet, that would certainly be a welcome development.

I know the Minister is from a rural area and, therefore, he has some understanding of rural communities. He will know how difficult it can be and how sometimes city-based people simply do not have an understanding of that. This has been the source of much of the frustration as well.

We are talking about children going to school in a situation where there is no other transport option unless parents give up their jobs to get their children to school. It really is frustrating. One of the major problems is that we have not being getting responses aside from stock responses. I will keep raising this issue and talking about it until someone sits down with us and says, for example, that there are definitely seats on the Paulstown bus and agrees to try to come up with a local solution. I would appreciate if the Minister of State, Deputy Halligan, would meet us and if we could have a timeframe for that as well.

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