John Dolan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The answer for the Clonmel-Dublin route, up to Dublin Airport, was, at one level, correct. There were sufficient seats to put bums on but all the Bus Éireann buses that were taken off the route were wheelchair accessible and none of the remaining buses was accessible nor were any required, under the licence, to be accessible. Whether the provider is public or private, it is unacceptable, if it is a public service, for the person with a disability who wants to go from A to B to have to worry who the provider is. It should be equally accessible if it is a public service.

That still leaves us shy of the issue of whether those accessible buses would be available as accessible stock on the day of the outward or return journey, which brings us to this issue of the notice period. We can change our minds. Someone could get a phone call tonight that a relative is not well or such, say that there is a bus at a certain time in the morning and that he or she will get it. A disabled person, using a wheelchair, cannot do that but has to wait two days with crossed fingers. That is a huge issue as is the one of people who are blind or deaf being able to have advance notice of where they are on the journey and what the next stop is. The whole service is patchy in that regard and is not up to the mark. There is a range of issues. I could go on. I think the witnesses get the picture.