A Longford-Westmeath TD is describing the school transport scheme as a complete mess.
The scheme intends to provide free school transport to children.
However, hundreds of families have been left without a place on a school bus which has led to widespread criticism of the scheme.
TD Sorcha Clarke told the Dáil that the government has failed to provide adequate capacity.
''At the root of this problem Tanaiste is the failure of government and the failure of Minister Foley to plan and deliver the additional capacity needed. Waiving the transport fees was not the mistake. The mistake was in fact in failure to invest in the additional capacity needed. And frankly, the government has made an absolute bags of this and families need solutions on they need them now.''
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar responded to the TD's remarks by noting that capacity has increased by 21,000 this year.
However, he admitted it still may not be enough
''In total 124,000 tickets have been issued as of September, and that is an increase of 21,000 over last year, so there is a lot of extra capacity. It's not fair to say that Minister Foley didn't plan for that. 21,000 additional tickets is not a small number, but I appreciate that it may not have been enough.''
