Munster tackles Minister Norma Foley on annual school transport debacle
Sinn Féin TD Imelda Munster has taken the Minister for Education Norma Foley to task over students not receiving school bus places again this year.
Deputy Munster said: “As sure as there’ll be an over-crowding crisis in the hospitals this winter, same as every year, there was a school bus capacity crisis this year, same as every year. This isn’t a new issue.
“School bus capacity and seats on the buses are always an issue leading up to the start of every new school year.
“The government knows this, the Minister knows this, but still, they allow these problems to persist. Now and as always, they have failed to plan for the new school year properly.
“This is happening all throughout Louth/East Meath as well as nationwide.
“There are households where both parents are working and households with one or no car that have no way of getting their children to schools that the government ignores.
“The reality of rural Ireland is that children cannot walk, or bike to school, that the government ignores.
“I had to highlight one particular case, one among many, to show the need for increased school bus capacity, regarding 16 secondary school students travelling from Collon to Ardee, all denied places.
“I made several representations on their behalf to the Bus Eireann School Transport Office. The responses were not positive.
“I then contacted the Minister for Education Norma Foley to highlight the need for increased school bus capacity for secondary school students travelling from Collon to Ardee. My email was acknowledged but there was no follow up from them.
“I contacted the Minister again, highlighting how anxious parents are getting, the closer we get to the new school year starting and the lack of viable alternative options for the parents.
“The response was on how the scheme is run, ignoring the points made in my email, offering nothing to the school children or their parents.
“It was a head in the sand response from a head in the sand government.
“The government can’t just add on more money and say it’s sorted.
“They need to attract new drivers, retain drivers, and drivers who are 70 plus and are medically cleared should be allowed to continue to drive.
“There’s a need for local knowledge and local co-ordination with an ‘identifiable person’ having direct contact with local schools and bus operators to bridge the information gap which is behind most of the chaos every year.
“It needs to be managed correctly, and the government can’t say it’s managed correctly when the problems are getting worse.
“The School Transport Scheme review was started in February in 2021 and is still not ready to be published. It should be published as soon as possible so we can get the governments head out of the sand and start to take proper measures to deal with the ongoing and worsening school transport problems.
