Seanad debates

Wednesday, 21 September 2022

10:30 am

Photo of Lynn BoylanLynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is bizarre that something that was seen as such a good news story for many parents has resulted in members of the Government parties having to introduce a Private Members' motion. The potential benefits of a free school transport scheme are plain to see. It is good for the climate, for air pollution, for schools and for families. It is good in the context of the safety of pickup and drop-off points outside schools and it is good for parents because they have a convenient way of getting their children to school. The term "management" has been used quite a bit during this debate. If it was managed correctly, free school transport could be an excellent weapon in the fight against the cost-of-living and climate crises. We know it is short journeys, in particular school drop offs, that add a significant amount to our carbon emissions. They are the types of journeys we are trying to make non-essential for parents so they have alternatives and do not have to drive their children to school.

As we have heard, management is important. The way the Government has ruled out the scheme has been a disaster. The Minister announced free seats without making sure that seats were available in the first place. That has only led to chaos and more stress for families. This was supposed to be a good news story for families to help ease their burden and all it has done is given a headache and extra stress to families.

A phrase used in conversations about public transport and cycle infrastructure is, "If you build it, they will come". If we put in place the infrastructure and remove the barriers people will use the service. Anyone who has a cursory understanding of economics will tell us that reducing costs will lead to an increase in demand. That does not seem to have been heeded.

There are points in the Fine Gael motion that seem to be trying to shift the blame away from the Minister and pin it on Bus Éireann. We know from a parliamentary reply that the Government liaised with Bus Éireann before announcing the decision, but it was only made clear to Bus Éireann that the scheme would be free 30 minutes before the plan was formally announced. The Minister has to accept responsibility for that and stop looking for others to pin the blame on.

Families across the country are outraged. Those expecting to see savings of €500 now look set to be heaped with additional costs as they try to find alternatives. People who have been using the service for years have been left without a place, while other parents have lost out due to the unfair lottery nature of the scheme.

The figures quoted in the Fine Gael motion raised a few eyebrows. There is nothing technically wrong with them, as far as I can tell, but they paint a remarkably rosy picture of the situation. The motion mentioned 44,000 new eligible students. I would like to know how many of those new students are actually replacing students who graduated and how many are additional seats. I figures I have show that 124,000 school transport places are being provided for the current 2022-23 academic year, while only 121,400 were provided for the past academic year. That is an increase of only 2,600 places, or 2%. Clearly, that is not up to meeting the reality of the demand.

The failure of the Government to harness the demand for buses has done damage to the wider climate movement. When it comes to climate action, one of the key asks across the spectrum is free public transport, but the complete bungling of the free school transport proposal has set that back. Sinn Féin supports the goal of free public transport and is committed to increasing the capacity of the system to make sure it is done right. We cannot just roll things out overnight if we do not have the bus spaces and capacity to deliver the service.

The school bus debacle could have been avoided. Obviously it is too late for that now, but we do not see the Government taking the steps required to address the problem. Additional capacity is the only thing that can solve this and it is still not being sought for concessionary pupils who secured pupils tickets for this school year. Sinn Féin has consistently called on the Government to provide an additional 10,000 places to be funded on the school transport system in 2023 and for capital funding to be provided for the purpose of new school buses.

That is why we have brought forward an amendment to the motion calling for those additional 10,000 extra places to be funded on the school transport scheme and capital funding to be put in place to provide for the purchase of new school buses, noting the age and quality of the current fleet of school transport buses. I encourage all those who spoke passionately during this debate about the hardship parents are going through due to the failure to access bus spaces for their children to support the Sinn Féin amendment.

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