Mr. Owen Reidy:

I appreciate that. My last point is the real red herring. We are told by everybody that we must do this to comply with the EU directive and the Dublin Transport Authority Act 2008. It is quite clear that we do not have to do it. There is an economic interest argument which it seems the NTA was 90% persuaded by.

This allows them to continue with the direct award model. Our view is that they should do that. We are, hopefully, getting out of the economic crisis and all of the stakeholders should consider this over the coming five years. We need a wider and more comprehensive debate, which should include those who use the service, about what kind of public transport system we want. We should revert to the direct award model.