Fury as students denied bus places for new term

A GALWAY community is facing transport chaos as more than 30 places on a school bus have been lost for the coming term.

Families in the Clonberne area, who have been sending their children to secondary school by bus eight miles away in Mountbellew, have learned this week they can no longer avail of the bus service.

This is because most of the 7,500 students using school buses who do not live in their school’s catchment area will no longer be accommodated.

It has come about as a result of the Government decision to no longer allow three second-level children share two seats.

PJ Rabbitte is furious his daughter Olivia will be forced to move to a school in Glenamaddy, only one mile nearer to home, if she is to be carried by the school transport system.

“We’ve been told there may be spare seats on the bus to Mountbellew but it appears unlikely,” said Mr Rabbitte.

He was one of around 50 parents who met on Tuesday to discuss the problem.

“Olivia went to this school because of the subjects on offer and because her friends were going. We’re going to have to uproot her to go somewhere else, after taking three years settling in and getting to know the teachers,” he said.

He and his wife Breege are working, as are both parents in most families in the area, so driving their daughter to Holy Rosary College is not feasible.

The same situation faces parents whose children attend the same school and St Jarlath’s Vocational School, also in Mountbellew.

“This decision, to make seating one-per-child without providing extra buses, has not given any consideration to people or their right to choose where they want to send their children to school,” Mr Rabbitte said.

“People are being treated with total disregard by the Government - the most annoying thing is to find out three weeks before the school year begins,” he said.

The Department of Education has been urged to clarify the situation.

However, it has said these catchment boundary students were never guaranteed a place and could only avail of spare seats after eligible students were catered for.

Fine Gael Galway East TD Paul Connaughton said dozens of parents had contacted him in recent days.

“I’ve seen many problems with school transport in 25 years of public life, but this looks like being the most emotional and bitter dispute in that time,” he said.