Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I understand that. It was a policy decision. That is banked. I accept Mr. Doocey's word on that. I will not go there as we are not going to discuss policy.

That is for a different forum. I will turn to something more minor, which is bus stops. Ms Graham, you will not be surprised I am revisiting this. You and I have had many conversations and I thank you for your help over the years. The NTA put in a fantastic one in Monasterevin, when it was part of the constituency. It is widely used. They are gone in at Kilminchy at Portlaoise. The one on the down carriageway, which is going into town, is fantastic. I meant to take a photograph and show it. The one on the outbound - northbound - carriageway is skimpy. There is no end on it. The wind and rain are blowing into it. It took an inordinate amount of time to put it up. It went on for months. The reason I plagued the NTA about those is you see people standing in the rain in the morning waiting to go to work, and going to work soaking wet. We want to encourage people to use public transport. There is a big population now in the town and it is great to see it there. Will you look at extending that bus stop, to try to copy what is on the other side?

Has anyone any idea what that cost? There were two huge diggers on site. I know there were some accommodation works and the council may have taken advantage of that. I do not know if the witnesses are familiar with the Catholic church in Portlaoise, but it has a massive steeple. It is no exaggeration to say that when that was built in the 1960s there would not have been much more concrete used to hold up the steeple of the chapel than went in under the bus stop. They were pouring concrete for days. I never saw anything like it. How much did that bus stop cost? I know the NTA is trying to do high-spec and wheelchair access. I understand all of that, but it seems a huge amount of time and work. It seems like overkill. I then saw this small bus shelter going on top and I wondered if that was what this was all about. How much do those bus stops and shelters cost on average? I welcome them and we will talk about more of them.