Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Byrne, for coming in today. One of these days the Minister for Education will come in to respond to these Topical issues. I look forward to that day; it would have been nice if it had been today.

Today I am raising the issue of school transport particularly for County Wicklow. The applications for the 2024-25 year will open shortly. Last year there was absolute chaos in Wicklow when it came to the school transport system. Hundreds of students were left behind when it came to school buses.

Despite having paid for their ticket and having received it, they did not get a place on a bus because there was no place for them when it came to September. We actually saw that in many instances, parents were only told on the Friday before schools were due to start that the school bus was not running. One can imagine the stress that put on families because parents work and have other commitments. They had assumed that a school bus would be taking their child to school. We had weeks and months of trying to work with Bus Éireann to get the bus drivers who were required to get these bus services up and running. To be fair to Bus Éireann, it put enormous work into this and it managed to reinstate many of the bus services after a point in time. Much pressure was put on parents, many of whom I spoke to. One of them had to give up her job because she was a lone parent and had no other way of getting her child to school. Another parent sent their child to live in a different house and town because it was closer to where they could get to school. We can see the impact this had on families. We still have three services which are not running in Wicklow - one service with 53 children and two special needs services - so the problem of lack of school transport provision is still ongoing.

At this stage in the year, we need the Minister for Education to ensure that this chaos and debacle does not happen again in September 2024. We need to ensure everything is in place and there are sufficient bus drivers, buses and services. When parents pay for a school bus ticket in the next month or two, they must be guaranteed that there will be a bus to bring their child to and from school every day without fail. That is very important. What measures have been put in place by the Department of Education and the Minister to ensure that happens? That is my first question for the Minister of State. How he can ensure that September 2024 runs smoothly?

The second issue I am asking about is the reimbursement of fees. A grant is being provided for parents who have had to drive their children to school. Unfortunately, it appears that this grant will not be paid to them until after the end of the school year. Parents are not yet receiving reimbursement for that money as it has to be done retrospectively. That is really unfair. I ask the Minister of State if there is any option for parents to be reimbursed on a term basis, so that on the completion of each term the money is calculated and provided to parents. To expect them to cover the costs of driving their children to school for an entire year when they have already paid for a bus ticket is very unfair. I would like an answer from the Minister of State on that.

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