Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)

I raised a number of local school transport issues in the Dublin West constituency on Tuesday. They were Gaelscoil Thulach na nÓg, Catherine McAuley National School and St. Peter's College, Dunboyne. I acknowledge that the Gaelscoil Thulach na nÓg issue has been resolved and the bus has been put in place. I appreciate that. On St. Peter's College, Dunboyne, we do not have a resolution there yet. We have children travelling from the Hollystown area to that school. It is in a different county and there is an issue because the children there attend a primary school that is also in a different county. It is in County Meath but it is the one closest to them and that is the only school they are in a catchment area for to get into secondary school. Then there is an issue of a bus crossing a boundary.

On the Catherine McAuley National School, it is a reading school. It is beside the Minister of State's own Department and I am sure he knows it. I am sorry - it is not, it is beside the Department of disability. That is a school that children travel towards from all over Dublin and there has been a major issue this week. There was no bus on Monday. On Tuesday, a bus was provided but there was quite a serious incident on that bus. This morning, children were travelling for about two or two and a quarter hours on that bus. These are primary school children. Traffic is bad in Dublin in the morning but it does not take two and a quarter hours to get from Dublin 15 to Baggot Street. This is a situation where we are trying to get 11 kids, all from different houses, onto the one route and it is just not sustainable. Could we please look at halving that into two smaller buses and not have kids on buses for two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening? It is just not sustainable. These are young kids. Some of them need movement breaks or the toilet. It is a long time to make any young kid wait to go across the city. I ask that the Minister of State look at the situation with the Catherine McAuley National School.

I want to flag two other situations where there is no prospect of a bus this year, the first relating to children from the Ashtown-Pelletstown area. That is a relatively new development in between Dublin's Fingal area and the Dublin City Council area along the Royal Canal. Many of the kids there cannot get a local school and are now attending Coolmine Community School in Blanchardstown. There is no provision for a bus there. The parents and teachers asked for it. There will be more children next year and the following year having to make that journey. I again ask that we look at that situation with children travelling from Pelletstown to Coolmine Community School.

I raise the issue of children who are living in the Tyrrelstown and Hollystown areas but having to travel to Ériu Community College. The reason they have to travel is that Ériu Community College is to be moved to their area. It is being moved right across my constituency from its current temporary location to a new permanent location. It is a mad idea. I think it is a bad idea. I have campaigned against it locally but nevertheless it is going ahead. Its new geographic location has now become its catchment area and kids are expected to travel right across Dublin 15 to achieve that. That might not seem like a big deal but there are no public transport links that go across that particular direction from the Ongar area to the Tyrrelstown area. There are no public transport links at all. The kids live here, the school is over here, and there are absolutely no links and again, a bus has not been put in place. This would not need to be there forever; it would just need to be there while we are in this transitional phase and I ask that the Minister of State look at the situation with Ériu Community College.

There are a lot of issues in Dublin 15. I know one often comes across these issues in rural constituencies but there has been a very significant number of issues in areas in my constituency this year and I ask the Minister of State to address the schools in question.

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