Keira Keogh (Mayo, Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister of State for being here. I welcome the fact that now over 170,000 children are availing of the school transport system, which is a huge increase on the 120,000 who previously availed of it. I also welcome that in the programme for Government we have committed to having another 100,000 avail of it by 2030. I understand the difficulty we have in recruiting bus drivers. At the same time, however, we have to acknowledge that the system is just too rigid. Probably only 2% of those who use the system are experiencing challenges with it. However, that 2% includes parents are stressed out of their minds, who are dealing with uncertainty and who are extremely anxious, from both a practical and a financial perspective. This affects rural families in particular. We need to start dealing with the system earlier in the summer in order that we avoid panic later in the summer and in order to help parents who are struggling to budget and who fine out late in August whether they have to pay or not.

We need more funding and better communication. When people are contacting their TDs, it is because the system is not working for them and they are struggling. Better communication would really ease the situation, as would more transparency around who is getting concessionary tickets and more flexibility, especially by means of the use of local knowledge. We can look at this in the context of the nearest and second-nearest school rule. The system is too rigid and does not take into account local knowledge and feeder schools. I think of students in Glenhest outside Newport who were advised by the system that St. Gerald's is their nearest school. Nobody in Glenhest goes to St. Gerald's in Castlebar because the Sacred Heart School in Westport, Sancta Maria College in Louisburgh and Rice College in Westport are the feeder schools for Glenhest. I will be selfish and take this opportunity to congratulate my school, the Sacred Heart School, on its centenary this week.

Another challenge of the nearest school rule is not taking into account that we live in a modern Ireland and that parents are working in different towns. School preferences and subject interests need to be taken into account. For example, some schools do not teach music. A gifted student who loves music may want to go to a school where it is taught. We have to keep siblings together. Some secondary schools do not offer autism classrooms. I know of a set of twins, one of whom will miss out on school transport if he goes to the same school as his twin. We need to respect tradition and keep flexibility in mind.

One mum who reached out to me said, "not knowing until the beginning of August just weeks before the school year starts whether you will need €75 or €800 to cover transport costs is so nerve-wracking". This comes into play when we look at Sancta Maria College. We have three buses leaving Westport to go out to that school. There is a huge tradition of children attending Sancta Maria College in Louisburg. For one child, attending Sancta Maria College costs €850 per year. For two children, the cost is €1,450. If you have three children, it will cost €1,800. Again, flexibility and local knowledge could be applied in this instance. If three buses are going from one town to another, even if it is not the nearest or second-nearest school, surely we should try to support people in the relevant communities.

I spoke about transparency. In the context of concessionary tickets, I am aware of an instance where ten people were on a waiting list for concessionary tickets. There were nine tickets available. Those responsible for making the decision in respect of allocating those tickets said that in the interests of fairness they would pull the names out of a hat. That did not take into account the fact that some families do not have cars or that there might not be safe footpaths or drop-off points in some areas. I heard another Deputy refer to disadvantaged families in this regard. Pulling names out of a hat may seem fair but that is not really the case when you take people's circumstances into account.

The final point I was to make relates to children with additional needs or those who are disabled who avail of bus transport. We really need to look at clear guidelines around simple things like food. If you have autistic children, a lot of the time their condition can often be accompanied by restrictive eating. Making sure a child is fed going out the door might mean sending them to school with a slice of toast. In that context, we sometimes hear that there is no eating or drinking allowed on buses. I reiterate what I said last week about providing further training and support for bus escorts who often have to deal with distressed behaviours. Let us put families and rural Ireland first and let us move away from the rigid rules.

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