Parents demand more seats on school buses

Bus Éireann’s School Transport section is handling a raft of appeals after hundreds of children across the county were left without seats on school buses last week.

TDs and local representatives are also fielding scores of complaints from angry parents exasperated by the situation.

A huge increase in applications for school bus tickets followed the government’s announcement that transport would be free this academic year. As a result, it appears many of the students traditionally on concessionary tickets, who had been availing of the bus in the past, did not get seats. “We’re absolutely distraught,” Ciara Donohoe from Ballymachugh told the Celt. Her son, who’s sitting his Junior Cert this year in St Patrick’s College, Cavan, had been on the bus for the previous two years when the family paid for the service.

It’s understood that more than a dozen students on that route through Mullahoran, Lacken and Ballinagh did not get tickets.

Describing the “stress” of the situation, Ciara adds: “Finding out that many of our friends’ children were also affected further added to my annoyance.”

A nurse by profession and a working mother, she further outlined her frustration.

“We paid fully for both previous years, first and second year, on the same bus transport. There were many early starts with COVID-19 in those periods to keep passengers to a minimum where children had their own seat, wore masks, etc. We continued to pay for a bus service when children had online learning from home with no questions asked by us. The professionalism of the drivers is to be commended may I add.”

She urged the Department of Education and Bus Éireann to go back to the drawing board and review the routes to ensure there are sufficient buses and seats.

“Planning deficiencies here are seriously obvious,” she continued.

“I implore immediate provision of a fleet of buses to sort this out. When fees return in the following year, no doubt this exhausted portal will resume normal standards. Over to you Norma. Finger out, now!” Ciara makes her appeal directly to the Education Minister, Norma Foley.

Fine Gael councillor TP O’Reilly has also fielded calls from numerous parents on various bus routes whose children have been left stranded.

“The introduction of the free school bus now has brought in extra people who wouldn’t have used the school bus previously. They’re taking up the seats of those who would have had concessionary tickets last time,” he outlined.

“I think it was a mistake on the government’s part to introduce it in this way. It should have been left that anyone who was on the bus last year would get on for free this year, rather than leaving it open to everyone. I know a lot of people who are just availing of the transport just because it’s free,” continued Cllr O’Reilly.

Post-primary students are eligible for public school transport where they reside not less than 4.8kms from and are attending their nearest education centre as determined by the Department of Education/Bus Éireann, having regard to ethos and language.

Distance eligibility is determined by Bus Éireann by measuring the shortest traversable route from the child’s home to the relevant education centre.

Families who are deemed concessionary are not attending their nearest education centre.

Fianna Fáil TD Brendan Smith has also made representations to Minister Foley on the issue after a number of “angry parents” contacted him.

“Concessionary tickets have been an important part of school transport for decades. Now we have students who had transport in the past and have no such provision for this school year.

“As a matter of urgency there must be a major mobilisation of every possible bus service, naturally with proper standards, to put in place these essential services. Many families are not in a position to bring their children to school, through work commitments or not having a car available to them,” he said, stressing the “urgency” of the situation.

Bus Éireann has released a statement regarding the issues in which it acknowledges the “unprecedented demand” for the school transport scheme this year.

“Bus Éireann school transport offices across Ireland have issued over 121,000 tickets for mainstream school transport. At the end of the previous school year, 2021/2022, there were over 107,000 students on mainstream school transport. As we are still processing remaining applications, we are not in a position to say at this time what the total number of tickets issued will be.

“In response to increased demand, we have to date secured over 272 additional school transport vehicles and 116 services have had larger capacity vehicles added to the service, or the route extended.”

The statement ends: “Bus Éireann is continuing to procure additional capacity for school transport services to cater for remaining pupils who meet the qualifying criteria of the scheme.”