Éamon Ó Cuív presses for numbers on late school transport applicants

I absolutely applaud the introduction of pre-school transport for everybody but as you know it does and it did raise a number of issues. I'm concerned to find in my constituency that I seem to have a lot of late eligibles who are still awaiting transport. I counted this morning I've still 30 students waiting for and I was wondering have we any idea of the amount of the amount of applications that haven't been processed and in particular do we know how many late eligibles, in other words people who are going to become eligible for school transport anyway that are still waiting for school transport. The School Transport Scheme is a significant operation managed by bus airing on behalf of the Department of Education. In the last school year over 121,400 children including over 15,500 children with special education needs were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country. The cost of the scheme in 2021 was £289 million. In July of 2022, as you are aware, the Government announced funding for the waiving of school transport scheme fees for the coming year as part of a wider package of cost of living measures. The waiving of fees were for those who were eligible for the scheme. Ticket registration for the 22-23 school year closed on 29 July, by which time almost 130,000 applications were received for mainstream school transport. This figure includes 44,299 new applications as well as rollovers from previous years. This time last year there were approximately 103,600 children on school transport scheme services. Already over 127,800 tickets for the 22-23 school year have been issued to applicants. So already in the region of 24,200 additional places have been created. This is an increase of 23 per cent. Specifically in regards to concessionary tickets there has been an increase of 33 per cent. Children are eligible for transport at primary level where they reside not less than 3.2 kilometres from and are attending their nearest national school, and at post-primary level where they reside not less than 4.8 kilometres from and are attending their nearest post-primary school or education centre, as determined by the Department. All children who are eligible for school transport and who have completed the application process on time are accommodated on school transport services where such services are in operation. In addition, pending completion of the outcome of the full review of the school transport scheme, temporary alleviation measures at post-primary level have continued for the 22-23 year. Under these measures, pupils are eligible to their next nearest school. As part of the budgetary process, some additional funding has been approved for the scheme, which has allowed officials from the Department, in consultation with Bus Aeron to provide additional capacity where it is possible to do so. Bus Aeron have been prioritising areas where these students, who did not meet the eligibility criteria, but were on-time concessionary pupils and had tickets previously. It is important to stress that this is subject to capacity considerations. Constraints in sourcing vehicles and drivers in certain areas of the country may also mean that it may take a number of weeks to explore solutions for additional capacity. The Minister, they prepared a long answer for you, telling me all the things I know already for many years about the school transport system. The question asked a very specific question. and that is the number who have not yet received a school bus ticket, the number of those who are what is termed late eligible and if you make a statement on the matter. So could I get from you the number of applications that were received and that have not yet been dealt with because some late applicants, late eligibles got them, some others didn't, some concessionaries got them, some didn't, so there was extra money given and there seemed to be fairly loose rules about it. So I was looking for information, hard information, hard facts and that is the number who applied who haven't got tickets and the number of those were what I'm terming late eligibles, in other words if they got it in in time, because there was a problem with Yahoo addresses in a reminder that was sent out and there was also a bit of confusion in amongst the public because there were no fees, parents who were used to paying the fees didn't realise they had to go back a second time. Thanks Deputy Minister. Thank you Deputy. Again I will confirm to you Deputy that over 130,000 applications or registrations were received by the 29th of July, also confirming to you that we now have issued 127,800 tickets at this point and it is ongoing. That is a 23% increase on previous years and a 33% increase as I have referenced in terms of concessionaries. Specifically in terms of the late application process, it is very important in terms of the late application process for families to know that the application deadline was in fact the 29th of April of 2022 and that the deadline to confirm registration was the 29th of July. Any application completed after this date is a late application and therefore many school transport services were already operating at full capacity. Whilst a number of late applications have been received, eligibility can only be determined at the time of assessment. These applications will only be assessed after all on-time applications have been processed and there can be no guarantee of places for late applicants. Minister, I have to say the second answer was much clearer than the first and I appreciate that. So there are 2,800 left, so we have established that. You have not yet told me how many late of those would have been eligible if they had put them in time and then I am going to raise why I am pursuing this. The website had to go down during the middle of the summer for a period because you had to update it when the free transport came out. Some day I applaud the free transport but it did cause its scramblings, caused its own confusions. The second thing, there was a problem that Bus Airmen admitted was Yahoo addresses, so they did not get the reminder the rest got and there was a little bit of confusion and that seems to, I have never had as many late eligible as I have had this year and in many of these cases they applied in April where they missed out was in the confirmation in July because of the confusion over the summer. So are they still looking at these and are they still considering granting them school transport because, you know, as they say, it's better late than never. Just in the first instance, just the reference to Yahoo and various, you know, and the difficulties there, in the first instance I would say to you if you have any specific cases where you feel there was a specific issue I would be appreciative if you would forward them to my department in terms of the email address but I am going to say that in the general and in the main that is not the only means of communication, you know, with parents. There were others, there was, you know, it was public information, it was advertised in terms of closing dates and the responsibility, you know, does rest, you know, with individuals who are applying to be mindful of the application dates but I am happy to take if there are any specific instances that you want to give me the details of I certainly will get those directly followed up. In reference to Deputy Durkan's point about there being available places on buses, I want to be very clear that there is a rigorous analysis of the availability of places and where it has been necessary to put on larger buses for those who are eligible and concessionaries asked you we have done that. The availability of places on buses I want to be very clear in some instances there may be an occasion where pupils do not travel on a particular day or you know there are other needs within a family that the child could be sick or whatever the case might be and there will be a free place on that day but that is not a consistent free place and indeed where a child or a young person is eligible for the ticket they have the ticket. So