Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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497. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills her views on the decision of Dublin Bus to not renew the contracts for school bus services across Dublin and to cut the school transport services for many schools; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [21257/20]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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School Transport is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department of Education. In the 2019/20 school year over 120,000 children, including over 14,200 children with special educational needs, were transported in over 5,000 vehicles on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country covering over 100 million kilometres at a cost of over €219m in 2019.

My Department was recently made aware that Dublin Bus had cancelled a number of services that operated in the main to serve certain schools in the greater Dublin area. These services were operated separately by Dublin Bus and children paid fares or availed of a range of weekly tickets when travelling. They were not part of my Department’s School Transport Scheme.

My Department understands that Dublin Bus has written individually to each affected school, explaining the rationale for the discontinuation of the services and outlining alternative transport options where applicable.