I congratulate my party colleague Senator Nicole Ryan and her partner on the birth of their daughter, Réidín. I wish them health and happiness into the future.

The portal for the school transport scheme closed on Friday for applications, payments and medical card details. A few years ago, there was a review of the school transport scheme and it was indicated and recommended that the condition that you had to attend your nearest school in order to be eligible for school transport should be removed and that the distance you must live from the school should be reduced. I am looking for an update on that. There were plans to increase capacity to, or perhaps by, 100,000 by 2030. I think it is the Minister of State, Deputy Moynihan, who deals with the issue. Could we ask him to come to the House and update us?

The particular issue that I want to focus on is medical card holders. If your child is attending the nearest school and is eligible for child transport, you do not have to pay if you have a medical card. However, if your child is not, and is depending on a concessionary ticket, you have to pay even if you have a medical card. That is unfair. If the seat is there and they can get the ticket on a concessionary basis and have a medical card, I do not feel such people should be punished by having to pay. We know the threshold for medical cards is very low so families who qualify for medical cards are trying to cope with small incomes. I know of a family whose children attended the second nearest school because it was the school of their parish. Their nearest school was in a different parish and they chose to have their child attend the school of their parish. They are medical card holders but have to pay for the child to use the school bus. They wanted their child to go to school in the parish in which they live because that is where the children would be playing football and so forth with their club. They are penalised for that. I have heard from other families in a similar situation. They do not feel they should have to pay for school bus tickets.

I also note that the primary school bus ticket doubled in price this year. It went from €50 to €100. For post-primary, the cost went from €75 to €100. In the overall scheme of things, that is not a huge amount for transport provision, but it is a big leap. It is also a burden when you place it with everything else that families are now trying to cope with in the context of cost-of-living pressures. I would welcome a debate if the Minister of State, Deputy Moynihan, were to come to the Chamber.