Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I think this is the NTA's first appearance here since our report last year which identified €150 million of lost spending as a result of the metro project. I want to come back to that, but just in case the witnesses need to reach for some figures on that, I am giving them some advance warning on it.

I will come to a more parochial matter. I was at my local Tidy Towns clean-up day on Saturday and the taxi rank in Finglas village, where drivers often stop me with several different questions. There were two taxis parked beside each other. One was a 152-D Toyota Prius hybrid, and beside it was an 08-D Toyota Corolla. The Toyota Prius, because of the ten-year rule, will have to come off the road next year; the Toyota Corolla will not. I have raised this in the Dáil. It seems illogical as regards vehicles registered prior to 2012. There is an anomaly in that regard. It also undermines the whole principle of where we are going with reduce, reuse and recycle. With the use of e-vehicles now, we will not be able to replace cars every ten years. We will be replacing the batteries in them. It is time to end the ten-year rule the NTA operates.