Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

It is extraordinary that the Minister introduced this session by outlining his vision for public transport and saying that it was about getting people from home to work, school and social activities, given the fact that, according to himself, when he met Bus Éireann and it revealed the disastrous situation it was in and the stringent changes it believed it had to make, he did not intervene or comment one way or the other. It would have been prudent of him to ask a few questions of it. For example, had the company tried to develop a business plan to enhance, promote and get more people using the Expressway service? Why did he not ask these questions?

I have a wider question on the vision for public transport. If it is about being a public service, why does Bus Éireann keep referring to it as a product? Expressway is a product to Bus Éireann, not a service. We must change that language. If we do not, we will revert to the scenario mentioned by another member of a swathe of towns, villages and less-populated areas being left without a service, rather than a product. That matters to the development of rural Ireland, the sustainability of communities and, to a greater extent, to the question of the environment and climate change. I am a member of the Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Change and Natural Resources and it strikes me that, instead of the Minister thinking one way and the Minister for Communications, Climate Change and Environment thinking another way, they need to bang their heads together and consider ways of getting cars off the roads, improving the public transport system and improving Ireland's failed record in reducing carbon emissions. Anybody travelling on the motorways can see bumper-to-bumper traffic with one person in each car because public transport is inadequate and unattractive, is not really public and is, by stealth, being privatised. If the National Transport Authority, NTA, keeps giving licences to private operators, it will make it impossible for the public service company, Bus Éireann, to deliver a decent service. That is why the Minister should have questioned Bus Éireann about whether it had a business plan to promote its services so that it might compete effectively. He should also question the number of licences that the NTA is willingly giving to private transport companies, thereby pushing Bus Éireann into this difficult position.