Tim Lombard (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the communities throughout the country that were involved in the Tidy Towns competition. Those volunteers have done Trojan work in every village and town. A certain town in Mayo was one of the national winners but rural towns such as Kinsale and Clonakilty retained their gold medals and Bandon got a bronze medal this year, which was very important. The work of those groups needs to be acknowledged. They are the true heroes of the community. They go out to ensure our towns and villages look very well. The knock-on effect is that the communities get support by way of tourism or industry. They are true heroes, and we should acknowledge that. I refer to an issue which arose at the education committee yesterday regarding the school transport service. Another colleague in the Chamber was at the meeting. It is one of the key issues at which we need to look. I raised it last week, am raising it this week and will probably raise it again next week or until there is some action.

The Minister in charge of the school transport service must come to the Chamber to go over the policy issues which are impinging significantly on people going to school. It is almost impossible for a person to get a bus, in particular in my part of the world, where he or she is just outside the area. There is no leniency and discretionary tickets are fading away because of population increases, in particular in the larger towns and villages close to schools. That means there is a knock-on effect on children in rural areas who cannot access a school bus service.

I have listened to the debates on this for the last 18 months and have continuously heard that it is a policy issue. As such, the Minister must come to the Chamber. We need a real debate on the vision. What does he propose to do for the education service to ensure that students can get school transport? The system is currently ineffective because it discriminates down to the square mile or even in terms of a matter of a hundred yards, as in some cases I have encountered in recent weeks. In fairness to Bus Éireann and other providers, they are only following the letter of the law. There must be a total change in the 314 districts in place now and the way we ensure bus services get pupils to schools.

There is a degree of discrimination involved here. If one is far away, one is excluded and told one is in the catchment of another school. That does not always work depending on the parish one lives in or the local demographics. If one has a parish which is aligned with a secondary school in the nearest town, pupils always go there. As such, a bus service should be provided. The whole system needs a real overview. We need to schedule time and to bring the Minister to the House. It is not about budget issues; it is about a change in policy and a complete review. What I really need is for the Leader to see if we can get the Minister to come to the House so that we can have a complete review of the policy. The policy is broken and, unfortunately, the service is not working.