Lisa Chambers (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Yesterday, at the Wild Atlantic Words festival hosted in Castlebar, I met a remarkable young woman who I went to school with, Geraldine Lavelle. Geraldine sustained a very serious injury in an accident a number of years ago and is now paralysed from the neck down. She was an active fitness person and she cycled and went to the gym regularly. She was a fantastic athlete as well as being a scientist and an exceptional young woman. She remains all of those things and has fought her way back from what was a devastating injury. Yesterday, she published her book entitled Weathering the Storm. I have not yet had the pleasure of reading it. It is on my list to read very shortly and I encourage others to purchase it as well. If ever there was a story of getting through adversity, barriers and everything that could be thrown at someone, this is it. She lost so much on that particular day and has come back to show that anything is possible if one puts one's mind to it. I was in college with her sister while Geraldine was the year below me and I know the family very well. She is an inspirational young woman and has come through so much. Yesterday, she was rightly acknowledged for her fantastic new book Weathering the Storm. Geraldine is a regular columnist with The Western Peopleand teaches in the Atlantic Technological University Sligo. She is, as I said, a scientist as well.

I congratulate Geraldine on her fantastic success - no doubt the first of many. She has dedicated much of her time since her injury to helping other people who have acquired a similar injury or paralyses. She has dedicated her time to helping others to come through the most difficult and devastating thing that can happen to anyone. I wish her well and congratulate her on the publication of her book.

A separate matter is the issue around school transport, concessionary and eligible tickets and all that comes with that. Every year, every single public representative is contacted - particularly in rural areas - by people who do not qualify for the bus because they are not going to the closest school and whatever. We make it really difficult for people. In this time of trying to get people out of their cars and onto public transport, we need to move to a system where there is no such thing as eligible or concessionary tickets. Any student that wants to take a bus should be given the option to do so. It is simply not safe in many parts of the country to cycle or walk to school, even if one lives quite close, because the cycling and walking infrastructure is not there yet. Some day it will be.

I request a debate at the earliest opportunity with the Minister for Education, Deputy Foley, to have a discussion about the future of school transport and how we might move away from concessionary and eligible tickets and move to a system where any student who wants a school bus, can get one. In my own county of Mayo, we have had particular difficulties as did every other part of the country. Straide in Mayo was a good example, among others, where people who had a concessionary ticket for many years did not get one this time but are now on a list to do so. I commend and thank the Minister, Deputy Foley, for securing the extra funds in budget 2023, to bring on stream additional capacity of more buses and more drivers. I also welcome the decision made by the Minister, Deputy Foley, and the Cabinet to prioritise those students who previously had a concessionary ticket and always availed of the bus service, and to deal with them first. That was the right decision to make. I would welcome such a debate.