The Government has announced a suite of measures designed to help families with school-going children returning to school in September
– To help struggling families with costs anyone who has applied for and receives a school transport ticket for 2022/23 will not be charged a fee for their school bus ticket this year. This will provide families with savings of up to €500 on the cost of tickets.
– Over 300 additional DEIS schools to benefit from the school meals programme.
– €100 euro extra on back to school allowance.
– An additional €50 million to be made available for Social Welfare Measures
– Additional €17 million for Education Measures
Department of Social Protection:
The Clothing and Footwear Allowance, administered by the Department of Social Protection is being increased by €100 for each eligible child under the scheme. Consequently, the amount being paid for each qualified child aged 4–11 years will be €260 and the rate payable for each eligible child aged 12 and over will be €385. It is estimated that some 151,000 families will benefit from this measure in respect of over 262,000 children. This is a one off measure for 2022 to assist families with back to school costs in the current year.
A further measure relates to the Department of Social Protection’s School Meals Programme. Currently, some 230,000 school-going children benefit from this programme. From today, an additional 310 schools, recently designated as DEIS schools in March are being invited to participate in this programme.
An additional €50 million in total will be made available to provide for these measures.
Department of Education:
The Minister for Education has announced that students availing of the school transport scheme will not be charged fees for the academic year 2022/23. This is a temporary measure for the current year only.
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If I can be of any assistance to you in any of the above, please do not hesitate to contact me or my office team.
