Covid-19 (Education and Skills): Statements Dail Éireann — 2020-04-23 ============================================================ Joe McHugh (FG), Donegal I thank the Deputy for raising this question and for his ongoing engagement on these issues. He is correct that when the first announcement was made the school bus operators were paid 100% and after the extension of the closure they were paid 50%. I have had discussions with officials about this and it is only right that bus operators be paid up to the end of term, irrespective of schools opening or not. That is only right and I wish to put that on record. Regarding refunds, many parents have paid for school transport. Like my previous point, I believe it is only right that they get refunds. We are in the process of working out what is the best and fairest way of doing that, but it will have to be pro rata for the time they did not use the bus transport. We are examining that issue. Will the Deputy remind me of the last question? --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2020-04-23/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:48:16+00:00 Sitting date: 2020-04-23