*Aoife Keogh addressing parents in Sixmilebridge. Photograph: Joe Buckley.
NO health and safety assessment was carried out prior to the introduction of a pilot school transport system in Sixmilebridge and Newmarket-on-Fergus for secondary school students in Shannon.
Parents in the locality have described the scheme as “a make it up as you go along project”.
For the 2024/2025 academic year, a Department of Education pilot project is being conducted along the existing public transport Route 343 on the Limerick-Shannon-Ennis corridor. This action comes after a Department of Education review of the School Transport Scheme which was published in January of this year. This review outlined a goal of delivering 100,000 additional children to school each day by 2030. One of the methods of delivering this substantial growth is to integrate with existing public transport which will allow more children to take the bus to school.
The 343 route corridor (and associated routes) was chosen because it is an established public transport corridor serving Limerick – Shannon – Ennis and underwent significant enhancement of services under the Connecting Ireland Rural Mobility Plan on Sunday August 25th.
It has emerged that prior to the commencement of this scheme, no health and safety assessment was conducted by either Bus Éireann or the Department of Education.
However, a spokesperson for Bus Éireann told The Clare Echo all necessary safeguards have been gained from the National Transport Authority (NTA). “As the children involved in the pilot scheme will be using Public Service Obligation (PSO) routes the necessary safeguards and approvals have been gained from the National Transport Authority (NTA). All PSO routes and stops are agreed in consultation with the NTA and bus stops must be approved by the local authority after thorough engagement before coming into use”.
“A number of engagements have been held with parent representatives, the schools involved in the pilot and political representatives from the area where certain issues have been raised and addressed where possible. One of those was the initial planned pick up point for pupils at Cratloe where a decision has been taken that these pupils will now be accommodated instead on dedicated school transport services as currently there is no public transport that can accommodate alternative routing at this peak hour. This route will be kept under review with regard to the potential to integrate with the 343 public transport in the future,” the spokesperson added.
Ten days into the pilot scheme, the changes brought about to date include the reinstatement of the dedicated Cratloe school bus, a second bus stop for approximately 100 students in Sixmilebridge to avoid 344 students all getting collected at McGregor’s Pub over a thirty five minute period.
Concrete was poured for a bus stop opposite St Caimin’s Community School on Monday which is hoped to alleviate overcrowding opposite St John and Paul Church. On Tuesday, eight students of St Caimin’s were left behind due to capacity issues.
Seat belts remain a concern for parents with none on the red and white city buses. Sixmilebridge parent Aoife Keogh explained, “Bus Éireann is using this bus twice a day since the evening of Monday the 26th of August. City Buses are generally used in urban areas where typically the speed limit is 50km/h, which allows for passengers to stand up on the bus while in motion, and has 70 seats with no seatbelts fitted. The use of these buses is against the law”.
She added, “both Bus Éireann and the Department of Education have a duty of care to these children to protect them and keep them out of harms way, there is also a moral and ethical responsibility on both bodies to implement best possible practice when it comes to health and safety standards and clearly this is not being done for children who have no choice but to use the City Bus and therefore cannot choose to use a seatbelt. We have huge concern around the fact that if this bus is being used in our area then other city buses are being used in other areas around the country where they shouldn’t be but Bus Éireann are getting by because of a technicality. The Kentstown incident happened almost 20 years ago, when five school girls lost their young lives when their school bus brakes failed, at the inquest it was stated that their chances of survival would have been significantly higher if they had been wearing seatbelts. Have we learnt nothing in the intervening 20 years”.
Parents have also started a petition to the Oireachtas after parent representatives met with Bus Éireann and the Department of Education for the first time. “The reason for petitioning the Houses of the Oireachtas is to ask the Oireachtas Committee to overrule the Minister Norma Foley and her Department of Education and the Department of Transport in their decision to instruct 440 children to transfer from a dedicated school bus service and to then instruct these students to use the public bus service to get to school in Shannon. We are petitioning on the grounds of public concern over the safety of the children and other road users. These concerns arose through the removal of our dedicated school bus service without any consultation with the relevant stakeholders,” Aoife explained. 1000 signatures are currently on the petition.
She said, “We have absolutely no objection to the vastly improved public bus service that the NTA and Bus Éireann have brought to both Sixmilebridge and Newmarket-on-Fergus, it was badly needed for the general public and historically both areas have had an abysmal public transport service. The piece we are not happy about is how the Department of Education saw it as an opportunity to remove the traditional school bus service without any consultation with the relevant stakeholders and then instructed all students to transfer onto the public bus service without any health and safety risk assessment to ensure the safety of students and other road users alike. It was evident from the first day of the scheme that very little planning and organisation had been done and it seems more of a troubleshooting exercise where problems are fixed when they pop up. If the project had been produced correctly the H&S Risk assessment would have anticipated the relevant health and safety issues and then controls could have been put in place to manage these situations. Instead, it feels like a let’s make it up as we go along project. It is our intention to keep fighting to get the safest possible service for the 412 students left in the pilot scheme to ensure that they all have a safe & happy school year ahead. We want the project to be scrapped and for public consultation to be re-opened, this time with full transparency, so that all the relevant stakeholders can make submissions and help to develop a school transport system that meets the needs and requirements of the communities involved”.
