Seanad report: The House observed a minute's silence as an expression of sympathy following the loss of five young lives in the Co Meath school bus tragedy.
The gesture was proposed by the Government leader in the Seanad, Mary O'Rourke, who said it was hugely saddening to think of what had happened to the teenage schoolgirls.
Government and Opposition members voiced shock at the number of dead and injured and spoke of the need to support the bereaved and the families whose loved ones had been hospitalised.
Joe O'Toole (Ind) urged that the tragedy be the spur to the drawing up of comprehensive guidelines for schools on how to deal with such terrible events. He said that following the Omagh bombing he had visited some of the schools where many of the child victims had been pupils, and in the aftermath of the Dunblane mass killing of school children in Scotland he had spoken with the school authorities there.
One of the problems that existed here, in Britain and even in the US, concerned how crises were to be dealt with when they affected schools. There was no understood psychological or psychiatric method of handling them. Even small things became huge. For example, how to deal with the media and the question of whether counselling should be done individually or severally.
Another issue was whether the survivors should be encouraged to go back to the scene of the accident and, so to speak, re-live it. There was no kind of model at present for dealing with such tragic events, said Mr O'Toole. It would be helpful if the Departments of Education or Health would take on board the appropriate way of doing things and put together some process which would be available to schools.
David Norris (Ind) said he had raised the issue of school bus safety, such as the level of vehicle occupancy and the need for seat belts, several years ago. It was time these warnings were heeded.
"I have raised consistently the question of the way in which asylum seekers and people who come to this country are stuffed into hostels which are not inspected for fire, and that is another tragedy waiting to happen.
"I am raising it now before there is a tragedy and I am saying to this House unless we act responsibly towards these people who are stuffed into unhealthy fire-hazardous places mainly in the north side of the city, there will be a tragedy and there will be 10 or 20 people killed."