Dáil debates
Thursday, 21 September 2023
Saincheisteanna Tráthúla - Topical Issue Debate
School Transport
6:25 pm
Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, for being here today, but I do wish the Minister for Education, Deputy Foley, was present, because this is a huge issue. It has been a big issue for a number of weeks now. We are not seeing the kind of response that is needed on this issue from the Department of Education, the office of the Minister or, indeed, Bus Éireann.
I am raising this issue on behalf of hundreds of parents and students in Wicklow who are still not able to get the school bus transport scheme. The buses are still not showing up for them. On Friday, 25 August, hundreds received an email from Bus Éireann saying that the school bus that was due to pick up their children on the first day of school, which was the following Monday, was not going to be showing up. No reason was given for this and there was no indication of when it would be resolved. Indeed, very little communication has happened since then.
There has been some effort. The inspector in Wicklow has been doing a lot of work trying to arrange alternatives and to help out. Some routes have been reinstated, but not all routes. There are still many routes that are not operational. Indeed, some routes that were operational seem to have disappeared weeks into the school year. The impact this is having on constituents is absolutely enormous and cannot be overstated. I have heard of parents who have had to take unpaid parental leave to drive their children to school. Parents have taken their annual leave and have used up their holiday time to do it. Parents have had to give up their jobs. One parent has had to hand in her notice because she is now needed to drive her child to school, when she has already paid for the school bus and she had been guaranteed that place would be available for her.
I have been contacted by families who have had to move their children to Bray so that they are actually closer to the school and do not need transport. One ten-year old girl was left on the side of the road when her bus did not show up. Despite it being one of the buses that did start off the year, it suddenly disappeared within a couple of weeks. That ten-year old girl was left at the side of the road with no idea about how to get home or how to get to school. That is completely unacceptable. There are huge health and safety issues associated with this. The communication that the parents have received from Bus Éireann has been really minimal. As a Deputy, I have been trying to contact Bus Éireann and the Minister's office and I am not getting responses on it either, which is really frustrating and very unfair to all those parents who want some clarity on when their child's bus service will be reinstated. I hope that in his response, the Minister of State will be able to fill us all in on exactly what is happening.
One key concern as well is that this is also impacting children with special needs. There are a number of special schools in the constituency and their buses were also not showing up. Ironically, one parent who is a teacher, cannot get transport for his child who has additional needs to get him to school and that teacher may now have to give up their job to drive their child to a special school. It just makes absolutely no sense.
This happens every year. However, this year it is particularly bad. Bus Éireann does not seem to have been prepared for it. Proactive measures do not seem to have been put in place to mitigate this. It is not just an issue in Wicklow. From talking to Deputy Catherine Murphy, I know it is an issue in her constituency in County Kildare. It is also an issue in Cork South-West and even in Dublin Central there is an issue with special needs transport for constituents of my colleague, Deputy Gannon. This is a major issue. I hope the Minister of State has an update that will allay all those parents' fears and will give them the information they need on this.
6:35 pm
Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy for raising the matter. Before I address the specific issues raised, I would like to provide an outline of the extent of the school transport scheme. The scheme is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department of Education. In the 2022-23 school year, more than 149,000 children, including more than 18,000 children with special educational needs, SEN, were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country. In addition, school transport scheme services were provided for more than 5,400 children who have arrived to Ireland from Ukraine.
The total cost of the scheme in 2022 was €338.9 million. The scheme is an important service for families and children. The purpose of the Department's school transport scheme is, having regard to available resources, to support the transport to and from school of children who reside remote from their nearest school. There has been an overall increase in both applications and tickets issued for the 2023-24 school year in comparison to the 2023-23 school year. Already more than 133,000 tickets have issued for the 2023-24 school year, which is an increase of 12% when compared with the start of the previous school year. The number of tickets issued so far has already exceeded the total number of tickets issued in the 2022-23 school year.
With regard to SEN transport services, to date, more than 4,200 new applications have been received for SEN transport for the 2023-24 school year, with some 1,400 of these having been received since July alone. This compares to some 3,670 new applications received at this time last year. To date, transport has been provided for more than 3,000 new applicants for the 2023-24 school year, with transport being provided for more than 19,000 pupils in the current school year. The Department continues to receive applications all year round.
As the Deputy will be aware, a review of the school transport scheme is nearing completion. The review is being conducted with a view to examining the current scheme, its broader effectiveness and sustainability, and to ensure that it serves students and their families adequately. The final report of the review will include recommendations on the future operation of the Department's school transport scheme. Once approved by the Government, it is planned that the review will be published.
On the topic raised by the Deputy, Bus Éireann has confirmed that no services were cancelled; in fact, in this case services were secured and tickets issued in good faith only for the routes to be handed back at the last minute. Bus Éireann has advised of significant shortages of drivers in the labour market overall and competing demands for drivers to deliver additional public transport initiatives such as Connecting Ireland, Bus Connects and Local Link services. Bus Éireann is continuing to prioritise sourcing vehicles and drivers. However, it has confirmed that, as of 21 September, a number of routes remain without a service. This equates to less than 1.5% of pupils, or less than 2% of vehicles, with services being provided for more than 98% of pupils on a daily basis.
With regard to the provision of services for children with special educational needs, as of 21 September, Bus Éireann confirmed that the number affected is estimated at approximately 1.3% of pupils. Some services are expected to resume as soon as an escort has been sourced and we are working with schools to ensure the resources are put in place.
Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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With all due respect to the Minister of State, my question was related to bus cancellations in Wicklow and he did not mention Wicklow once in this reply. Could he please tell me what I will tell parents in Wicklow who do not have a seat on a school bus for their children tomorrow and next week? While he can play with words and say that they the routes were not cancelled but were handed back, the end result for parents is exactly the same. Parents are giving up jobs and moving their children to different towns. It is absolutely disgraceful. Parents paid for their tickets early in the year. They were guaranteed seats in May but the bus has not shown up for them.
I really wish the Minister of State had not spent half his time talking about how great the school bus transport system is; it is clearly not fit for purpose. While he can say that only 1.5% of pupils are being impacted, that amounts to 2,000 pupils. Some 1.5% of 133,000 is a lot of pupils and, therefore, 2,000 families are being impacted by the lack of a bus service. The fact that we are not getting any additional information from the Minister of State is just not acceptable.
With regard to the exceptional no-service interim grant of €5 a day, first, it is paid retrospectively, and some parents do not have the money to cover that upfront. Second, it is a very small amount and if people are trying to get from one end of County Wicklow to the other, that will not get them very far. Third, that is all well and good if there is alternative public transport in your area. There is not. Public transport is not available for the majority of my constituents. Public transport provision in Wicklow is absolutely disgraceful. There is not a sufficient amount of it, and parents do not have all these different options available to them. It is up to parents now or their families or friends to transport their children to school. It is not acceptable. It is not the service that they were promised or that they paid for, and it is certainly not the service that the Minister for Education continually refers to when she talks about the great public transport service that is there for children.
Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Before I ask the Minister of State to come back in, I have in the past while seen that Ministers come in with scripts prepared for them by somebody else or by a different Department. We are very grateful to the Minister of State, Deputy Collins, for being here to take this matter, but it is completely unacceptable for any Department to provide a Minister, who is good enough to be here to deal with the issue, with a script that does not address the issue. It is not fair to the Minister of State and it is most certainly not fair to the Deputy who tabled this issue in the proper fashion. I will revert myself tomorrow to the Department of Education on this particular matter. I ask the Minister of State to conclude.
Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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Could I say something?
Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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No, we cannot have a debate on it.
Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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I was just saying I will make myself available for a Topical Issue next week so the Minister can come in and address it. I know parents are really worried about it, and I will make sure I can get in for that, if it is possible.
Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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I concur wholeheartedly with what you have said, a Cheann Comhairle, in this regard. The criticism you have raised about there being no mention of Wicklow is valid. Equally, I am grappling with what the Deputy articulated in my constituency in Limerick.
What is being experienced in County Wicklow is the same in Limerick. We are trying to work through that. The Deputy did not mention it but the reply prepared for me mentions the issue of the shortage of drivers. It has been raised by everybody around this House and I am happy to raise the fact that when a person reaches 70 they are not allowed to drive for Bus Éireann. It is crazy. I have never heard Bus Éireann offer an explanation for it to anybody. There can be the farcical situation in which students are transported to and from school in a bus which has to be driven by a man or woman aged under 70 but in the middle of the day, they could take a tour to the Dáil and the Houses of the Oireachtas in a bus driven by a man or woman who could be 85. It does not make sense. Bus Éireann, which is charged with running the scheme, needs to take a long hard look at that. I will convey to the Minister for Education the sentiments expressed by the Deputy.