Independent TD for Laois Offaly, Carol Nolan, has said that her offices are dealing with an increasing number of families who say their children are being left with no means of travelling to school following last minute refusals by Bus Éireann to offer school transport tickets for the forthcoming academic year.
Deputy Nolan was speaking after Minister Normal Foley confirmed that there has been a significant increase in the number of students applying for the school transport scheme following a decision by Government to make the service made free as a cost-of-living measure from the Government.
This has led to severe capacity issues for approximately 15,000 students nationally:
“I think we can all accept that they decision to waive the average fee of €500 was a welcome move that saved families a lot money at a time of increasing financial pressure,” Deputy Nolan said.
“However, anyone with an ounce of cop-on should have been able to foresee that making the service free was always going to increase the numbers of those applying and that this would then require timely and advance actions to ensure greater numbers of buses were made available.”
“This has not happened and as a result, families in both Offaly and Laois, particularly in rural areas, are now under incredible strain as they scramble to try and source transport for their children.”
“I have had parents on to me who say that they have been attempting for months to contact Bus Éireann to try and have these issues addressed and they simply cannot get through to anyone, nor are their emails being replied to. This is contemptible negligence towards parents and indeed the students themselves who are absolutely reliant on this service.”
“What is also clearly emerging is the need for Bus Éireann to immediately implement a number of minor route diversions that would enable children to be collected and placed on buses, that as some parents have told me, are routinely half-empty,” she said.
“The Minister, the Department of Education and Bus Éireann need to urgently address this matter. It is causing fierce anguish to many parents who genuinely have no way, short of leaving their jobs, of getting their kids to and back from school,” said Deputy Nolan.
Cork South West TD, Michael Collins, also called on the Education Minister to intervene and “end the school bus mayhem”.
He also said that his constituency office was “being flooded with calls from parents whose children have been refused seats on school buses”.
“Failure by the Minister, her Department and Bus Éireann, who operates the school transport scheme on behalf of the Department, to adequately forward plan, prepare and administer the bus operation ahead of school’s reopening is deplorable,”
“The Minister’s excuses, including those responsible, place blame on multiple factors, including a surge in demand and a lack of buses and drivers; these, however, are not credible. Forward planning should have foreseen such a scenario, especially when almost 115,000 applications were made prior to the July 29th closing date,” he said.
He said the Rural Independent TDs wanted “the Minister and the Chief Executive of Bus Éireann must take full accountability for their combined failure to prepare and have adequate bus capacity available at the beginning of this school year.”
Students are eligible for transport at primary level where their home is 3.2km or more from their nearest national school they are attending — and not less than 4.8km for secondary school. Concessionary tickets were traditionally given to pupils who did not necessarily meet the criteria for the scheme — for example, those not attending the nearest school — where there was capacity on a bus route.
Families that normally would pay an annual ticket charge will not be charged a fee for their school bus ticket for the 2022/2023 school year.
However, the outcome of this policy change means that 15,000 children have had their applications rejected.