Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry South, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 141: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will assure the public that all the funding provided to his Department for transporting school children to schools is used for that purpose only and not redistributed to other sectors of our public transport service; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [22895/11]

Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context

The school transport scheme, which is operated by Bus Éireann on my Department's behalf, facilitates the transportation of some 120,000 children to primary and post-primary schools each day including approximately 8,000 children with special educational needs. School transport is a very significant national operation involving about 42 million journeys and over 82 million kilometres on 6,000 routes every school year. This service is delivered using a mix of Bus Éireann, both school transport and road passenger vehicles, private contractor vehicles including private operator scheduled services, and Dublin Bus, Irish Rail, DART and LUAS where practical. The 2011 allocation to my Department for the provision of School Transport is almost €180m. I can assure the Deputy that expenditure from this allocation is used solely for the provision of school transport in accordance with the terms of the school transport schemes.