The Nationalist Party on Monday slammed the government for lack of planning for the provision of school transport and said it was unacceptable that the prime minister was blaming parents for the current situation.

Shadow minister Clyde Puli said the government's lack of planning was evidenced by the fact that 800 pupils in church and independent schools were still without the transport promised by the government. And students who had private transport before had now lost it. 

To make matters worse, the prime minister speaking on Sunday blamed parents, saying they had left it to the last minute to apply for transport for their children.

This, Mr Puli said, was unacceptable. The government first blamed the transport operators and it was now blaming the parents, when it was solely to blame because it had left everything late despite announcing the transport scheme a year ago in the Budget speech.  

He urged the government to immediately resolve the outstanding problems and also make arrangements for the pupils to be supervised on the buses and vans. 

Labour reaction

In a reaction, the Labour Party said parents would be saving thousands of euro as a result of the new school transport system and other government measures such as free childcare and the removal of exam fees. 

It said the PN could not stand seeing the Labour government implement its promises and had even tried to hinder an agreement between the government and the bus operators.

Were it for the PN leader, the scheme would not have been introduced this year, it said.  

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