Garret Ahearn (Fine Gael)
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The Minister of State is very welcome to the Chamber. The safe routes to school programme was developed by the NTA in partnership with An Taisce's Green-Schools in 2020 as a response to the need to support schools to increase walking and cycling to school. The aims of the programme are to improve safety at school gates by providing front-of-school treatments to alleviate congestion and improve access; to improve access routes to schools by improving walking and cycling infrastructure; and to increase the number of students who actually cycle to school by expanding the amount of cycle parking available. Parked cars on footpaths create dangerous situations and restrict access for everyone, especially young children, parents with buggies and wheelchair users. The scheme has helped to transform the accessibility of schools up and down the country and should be expanded further. I can think of many schools in Tipperary alone where there are dangerous situations at pick-up and drop-off times.

The programme opened in 2021 and there has been good uptake in the two funding rounds. Approximately 900 schools applied for funding under the programme and 170 were notified on 30 June 2021 that they were successful. There was a second round and just over 100 schools were successful but obviously, there are thousands of schools across the country. As with any scheme that is set up, and we saw this with the hot school meals programme, some schools do it quite quickly while others do not. Some schools are not sure and a lot of people did not understand the programme at the time but there is definitely a demand for it right across the country, especially in rural areas.

In the context of next week's budget, I am calling for additional funding for this programme. The view in the Department seems to be that all of the schools that apply for funding will be successful over time but there are thousands of schools that have yet to apply for it. Given the impending reduction in speed limits to enhance road safety, this programme is much-needed and there is huge demand for it. There is an opportunity here for us to do more. We all know of schools in our area where it is extremely dangerous. I just started bringing my child to school two weeks ago. It is a lovely country school but I can see the danger every morning and the possibility of something happening. The more we invest in safe routes to school and in improving the ease of access into schools, the better. I ask that something is done on that in the forthcoming budget.

Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Senator for raising this matter. When one is parked outside the school gate or one is walking to school, it really focuses the mind on the safety of children going to school. I am dealing with this matter on behalf of the Minister of State, Deputy Lawless, who has given me a comprehensive answer. As we all know, the Government is committed to achieving a modal shift in transport and increasing the number of active travel journeys over the coming years. This is evidenced in both the commitments made under various policy documents, including the programme for Government, the climate action plan and the Department of Transport’s national sustainable mobility plan, as well as the significant increase in funding for walking and cycling measures over the past four years. It is important that we move quickly to reduce our carbon emissions and in doing so, we must promote a modal shift away from private car use. This will not be achieved without the provision of alternative transport modes such as active travel.

The programme for Government sets out an ambitious and wide-ranging set of commitments in relation to walking and cycling and has committed that €360 million in cross-government funding will be spent on walking and cycling per annum over the lifetime of the Government, equivalent to 20% of the 2020 transport capital budget. This investment will help support the planned delivery of almost 1,000 kilometres of improved walking and cycling infrastructure by 2025 as well as additional investment in greenways.

The active travel infrastructure programme also funds the safe routes to school programme which specifically targets schools around the country and provides them with safe, connected walking and cycling infrastructure projects at various scales. The programme is funded by the Department of Transport through the National Transport Authority and An Taisce's Green-Schools is co-ordinating the programme. Invitations to express interest were sent to all primary and secondary schools in the country. I acknowledge that it was launched in March of 2021, when we were in the middle of Covid. Schools were not open at the time and it probably took until the end of 2022 and into 2023 before schools started applying at scale. A total of 932 schools applied to the scheme, equating to around a quarter of all schools in the country.Some 170 schools were selected for round 1 of the programme in the summer of 2021. Subsequently, two schools deferred their applications and one withdrew, leaving 167 schools in round 1. Round 2 of the programme, consisting of 108 schools, was announced on 12 December 2022.

Despite being launched in 2021, just 77 of the total 930 remaining safe routes to school programme schools have had projects completed. This is due to various factors, including the initial time spent setting up the programme and developing the various resources for stakeholders involved, as well as the time it has taken to progress projects through the earlier planning stages, which are now nearing the construction and delivery stages. The rate of delivery is now increasing, though, as local authorities have become more skilled at delivering safe routes to school projects. However, scheme acceptance and funding are still challenging factors.

A note was provided on active travel investment grants in 2024. The allocation for Tipperary County Council amounted to €4 million. While the note does not provide a breakdown between north and south Tipperary, this is significant funding. I have seen some of these schemes in my constituency. Although it takes a while to put them in place, when they are in operation they work really well. The whole focus, as I know, is to keep children safe as they go to school and to make sure they can cycle or walk if they so desire.

Garret Ahearn (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister of State. I appreciate the response and I understand the challenges. I understand the funding challenges and that this scheme started in 2020, but it is disappointing that only 77 of the 930 projects have been done. While I fully understand that Covid happened, when a scheme is put in place people want it to be delivered as quickly as possible.

This has not only happened in Tipperary. The issue has been raised with me by Councillor Gareth Scahill in Roscommon, who has seen it in schools in Castlerea. He also has a young family and he knows the challenges facing parents. He made the very good point that there is a suggestion that the council can pay for this through its roads funding. Councils have their own challenges with roads funding, including what they can pay for and how much they have each year. They seem to be losing money as opposed to receiving extra money for new funding schemes. If we are going to do this scheme, it needs to be done through Department funding rather than council funding because most councils cannot allocate funding to it.

While I welcome this programme, it has been slow to get off the ground. It makes a big difference to schools and parents dropping kids to school. The more it is used and the quicker it is done, the better. As the Minister of State said, its implementation has been speeding up in the last year or so, but the more we can do, the better.

Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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While there was an enthusiastic response to the initial call for applications under the programme in 2021, with approximately one quarter of schools in the country registering to apply, this naturally means that three quarters of schools were not enrolled in it. It should, however, be noted that because a school is not currently in the programme, that does not mean it will not receive any new or improved active travel infrastructure. While there are currently no plans for an additional call for schools to join the programme, funding for active travel infrastructure for schools is not confined to the safe routes to school programme alone. In some cases, schools outside the programme are included in wider active travel projects, if they are in the vicinity of these works. In fact, all active travel funding looks to improve links to schools, where possible, and this will be provided through the programme for Government commitment of €360 million.

I detailed the amount provided to the Senator's area. We should give any assistance we can to schools. Voluntary boards of management are trying to progress these issues and this funding will be welcomed by them. I thank the Senator for raising this important issue.

Martin Conway (Fine Gael)
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I, too, thank Senator Ahearn for raising this extremely important issue, on which I hope we will see progress. I thank the Minister of State for taking all the Commencement matters. We know she is busy, so her time is appreciated.