Ruairí Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I concur with what has been said. We have a scramble every year. We hope that our numbers are sorted for concessionaries on the basis of luck and then every local elected representative gets involved in these campaigns in areas. I have told the Minister previously that sometimes they almost welcome it as a chance to show themselves as busy, but I would be a hell of a lot happier if we could just get this issue off the agenda. We need to examine what constitutes a concessionary ticket and the eligibility criteria and that includes distance, particularly if a second school is being taken into account. We had particular issues in County Louth where there were, say, three schools that were equidistant from each other with very little in the difference. It ended up as a hames for a huge number of children as the Minister knows. We need a paradigm shift around moving people to the bus so we have to do what we are doing this year and more.

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