Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I will try to be brief. I will start with Bus Éireann. Mr. Murphy in his opening statement said the customer is central. I am sorry to say that does not bear out my recent experience with Bus Éireann. The only way I can test its commitment to putting the customer at the centre is with the complaints I get from people. I have ongoing, daily complaints from people left behind regarding the service being provided in a number of places in Kildare. I talk to the National Transport Authority about this. They are the only ones who would take a call from me. I have failed for the past three weeks to receive even a call back from someone in Bus Éireann, which is absolutely unacceptable. The service is erratic in spots. Double-decker buses are now single-decker buses and the latter do not have the capacity. People are at risk of losing their jobs. We are at that point. This has been going on for weeks. When I talked to the National Transport Authority, it told me there was an industrial relations issue and that there would be penalties for non-compliance, but that happens quarterly in arrears, so people have been putting up with this erratic service for three months. If there is an industrial relations issue, it behoves the bus company to tell people that, that is, to put them on alert and not to have a situation where customers go out in the expectation that a bus will turn up, having looked at a timetable, only for it to pass them by when it does turn up because there is a capacity issue. There is a very serious issue right across the east coast. Bus Éireann needs to come out very publicly and say exactly what is happening and what it is doing about it, otherwise it will lose customers. It is certainly losing its reputation in this regard and this certainly does not bear out what Mr. Murphy said at the beginning of the meeting. I even approached the Minister on two occasions and asked him to get me someone who would give me a call back to tell me exactly what is going on in order that I could pass on that information. Even that has not worked. I just do not know. Bus Éireann seems to be impregnable at this stage and there is no public relations aspect to it. The company really needs to deal with this because Kildare is one area where there are very well used routes that will be compromised.

I will go on to a number of other questions and I-----