Mr. Jim Meade:

We are trying to speed up the lines on the main arterial routes initially. Over the past couple of years, we have done some work on this. We have invested €10 million per year on the Cork route to carry out what we call ballast cleaning, which is essentially like rebuilding a road. We are rebuilding the road under the tracks and the ballast. I am sorry to use technical terms but basically we are refurbishing the road under the trains. That work means that trains can travel at 100 miles per hour on the majority of the route from Dublin to Portlaoise. People talk about quick journey times. The train to Cork is faster than a car if one is driving legally and if one is travelling from city centre to city centre. People will say that they can do Dublin to Cork in "X", "Y" or "Z" but if there were more Garda Gatso vans out there, they would not be doing it so quickly. We all see that on the motorways.

Our plan is to gradually and consistently build up the speed on those routes and over time, in the context of the longer term policy, we need to look at electrification. It is the most environmentally friendly and safest way to travel.