Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The answer I got was the one I was expecting. I am, though, making a specific plea for this area. The Minister of State is absolutely correct. Bantry is a much closer school in this area. In some instances, as well, it could be Skibbereen. This is based on student needs, however, and we should always put students and what best suits them first. Unfortunately, every summer, certainly ever since I became a TD, we have had this constant battle on our hands in our constituency offices coming up to July and August. It is firefighting. New blackspots emerge concerning routes in our constituency where students and children are not being looked after.

For the past year, one of these blackspots has been in the parish in which I live, Ardfield. In this case, five concessionary students were not able to get tickets. This year, in the same parish, and these are families living around me and people among whom I am living, 18 students will be concessionary. Some of them may get tickets, but at least ten of them will be left without a bus ticket. I am not sure how I am supposed to face those families, students and people living around me if I cannot get them bus tickets. In Ardfield-Rathbarry, students either go to school in Clonakilty or in Rosscarbery. For the students I am talking about, the school in Rosscarbery is their choice. This is where their parents and their sisters went. It is where they go, but they are not getting tickets.

I will hold up this map for the Minister of State to illustrate the problem. Each pin drop on the map represents the location of one or more students in the Ardfield area. These students are all living in the same area and most of them will be left without a ticket this year unless he intervenes. I would love if he could reach out to the Minister for Education. I will also do so. I am using this time now to try to help these kids to get a ticket and a seat on a bus to go to the school that their parents and others in their families went to in Rosscarbery. It is extremely important that this happens. We cannot leave these students behind again. We left them behind last year, but they need to get sorted this year. I thank the Minister of State.

See this speech in context