Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I have two quick final questions the Minister of State might be able to answer. First of all, he recently visited County Clare with me and we were very grateful to have him there. He visited the motor taxation office, which is the headquarters for everything in Ireland and where vehicle log books are processed. It is a fascinating place. I never knew until we went into the bowels of that building how much actually happened there. It was incredible. One thing we saw as we turned every corner were buckets on the floor and dripping roofs. The building has had its day. The Department of Transport some years ago bought an industrial unit in the industrial zone in Shannon with a view to moving the motor taxation office over there. I do not expect the Minister of State to have an answer on this today but that building is not fit for purpose. It is not right to have staff in there. Many really important national records are held within that building. There are computer systems with pretty sketchy roofing over them and leaks and whatnot. I would love for the Department of Transport to prioritise a new home for that unit.

The regional airports review is under way and the deadline for submissions went through just last month. At the moment in Ireland, our rule for providing funding to regional airports is that airports have a passenger throughput of 1 million or lower. However, EU state aid rules allow us to fund airports that have a throughput of 3 million passengers or lower. Therefore, the ask of Shannon Airport, Cork Airport and Ireland West Airport Knock - the west of Ireland airports - is that in budget 2024, which will be announced in early October, the Government will honour that.

We are worried that although the regional airport review is happening, the budget is coming up and if we do not accommodate this somehow, they will lose out on budget day and that funding stream will not happen. The Minister of State might even give an assurance today that there is some positivity happening on this front. They are just worried that the data set that is being used now is based on a Covid throughput of passengers. The data set that will be scrutinised this September will be from last year, which was a good year for them. However, all those airports, crucially, are under the 3 million passenger ceiling the EU sets. Surely, we can fund them. It just gives them a lease of life and allows them to flourish.