28 August 2021, Saturday
By Tom Collins
tom@TheCork.ie
Bus Éireann operates the School transport scheme on behalf of the Department of Education. It will issue almost 100,000 bus tickets by Monday for the new school year. Free school transport is available for primary school children travelling to their nearest or second-nearest school which is more than 3.2km from their home, and for secondary school pupils who live more than 4.8km away from their school. However, there are delays in issuing tickets this year.
Cork East Labour TD Seán Sherlock has said that the delay needs to be urgently addressed by the Department of Education. “The school year has started but yet concessionary tickets have not been issued to people,” said Deputy Sherlock. He continued “So many families are understandably, anguished about this. They’re not sure whether or not their children, sons & daughters will have tickets for the coming school year. We’re calling on Bus Eireann to be given a greater allocation of resources through the Department of Education to manage this scheme, so that the tickets can be issued, and that they can be issued straightaway so the families can have some peace of mind that when their sons and daughters are going back to school and If concessionary tickets have been granted that those tickets will be allocated as a matter of urgency.”
File photo of Sean Sherlock TD. Profile: He is the only Labour TD in Cork. Labour has just 7 TD’s nationwide, and 4 Senator’s
