Ann Phelan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour) | Oireachtas source

On the bus service, I take the Deputy's point about how we learned about it. To put it mildly, I have expressed my concern about that. This is exactly what I am talking about. In rural communities, one does not go in and pull the rug out from under their feet. This caused considerable concern, anxiety and stress merely due to the lack of coming to the community and saying that we must bring people together and consult with them. I understand that people make decisions for commercial reasons but one must be sensitive to rural communities because the loss of a service there is devastating. I keep referring back to the protocol that we need to put in place involving a series of actions on how the community is consulted.

I understand this is a significant issue in counties Laois and Kildare. I do not yet have the specifics of the working group worked out. I have not decided who will be on it and who will not. I was going to leave that to the community to come to me with who it feels appropriate. I will work with the NTA as it will have to be part of the group. I was trying to leave it open to the community. I assume it will have its own community representatives on it. I was not being very prescriptive at the public meeting last night about the working group. What I wanted to achieve last night was what we got - a bit of breathing space, a bit of support to look at how we come up with an alternative and an acceptance by the community that it would look at a working group, work with me and work with the NTA to see what alternative we can produce.