John Dolan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat. The Chairman mentioned the users of public transport services in his initial remarks. The reason we are here is that it is often more potential than users. I welcome the tripartite way this module has been set up, with the public transport operators coming in next, then the various responsible and regulatory bodies, followed by the committee's report to the Minister. The committee is starting with the right people first.

I welcome the opportunity to present to the committee on behalf of the Disability Federation of Ireland, DFI. We all expect and live by consistency in our daily lives. When we turn on the light in the morning it works, as does the kettle. Similarly, when we go to the bus stop or train station, we expect them to arrive on time and to be able to bring us to our destinations. I ask the members of the committee to think for a couple of seconds about the frustration that would build up if a person went to the bus stop or the train station to get to his or her place of work and, as he or she neared it, that person did not know whether he or she was going to be able to get on the train or bus. That is the daily grind and the committee will hear a lot more about that this afternoon.

Ireland has a long-standing commitment to include people with disabilities fully. Each and every member of this committee supports equality for people with disabilities. However, people with disabilities need to experience this support in their efforts to have a reasonable quality of life. They need to experience this in their day-to-day living. We now have more than 643,000 people with disabilities in Ireland, 13.5% of the population. That is up from just under 600,000 people in the previous census. Public transport is what it is called and it needs to be for all of the public, including those who are part of this important demographic group. An important point is that public transport is not an end in itself. It is a vital connector of people to services and opportunities. A person does not go on a journey just to go to the end and then turn back. He or she goes on the journey to get someplace and to engage in some way or other. Public transport has a huge role in promoting health and well-being as well as access to training and employment. Those are just two critical areas but we can think of many others.

People with disabilities live in families and, thankfully, more and more are part of and want to stay in the community. This is a very critical element. Without accessible public transport, the person with a disability is being left outside and left behind. The Government is committed in its Programme for a Partnership Government to the ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, UNCRPD. This has implications for transport. The convention states in Article 9 on accessibility:

To enable persons with disabilities to live independently and participate fully in all aspects of life, States Parties shall take appropriate measures to ensure to persons with disabilities access, on an equal basis with others, to the physical environment, to transportation, to information and communications, including information and communications technologies and systems, and to other facilities and services open or provided to the public, both in urban and in rural areas.

That is important. The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission Act 2014 emphasises the public sector duty where it states:

A public body shall, in the performance of its functions, have regard to the need to:

[1.] eliminate discrimination,

[2.] promote equality of opportunity and treatment of its staff and the persons to whom it provides services, and

[3.] protect the human rights of its members, staff and the persons to whom it provides services.

In my time with the DFI I have had the privilege of engaging with hundreds of organisations dedicated to assisting people with disabilities and speaking to and hearing from people with disabilities. All of these see the devastating effect poor access to public transport has on their own lives and the lives of the people with whom they work. We can grasp non-accessibility fairly easily when it comes to someone using a wheelchair. We can see the picture. However, this is only one aspect of the issue. Many people have less obvious mobility impairments, for example, people with restricted mobility, those who are deaf or hard of hearing, the blind and visually impaired, and, only now beginning to be recognised, those with sensitivities to the noise and intensity of the environment around them, often but not exclusively people on the autism spectrum.

We also need to look at those citizens who are living longer but lose capacity in a range of areas. We might say that as we age, we slow down. That is a point in life when people can lose their confidence and be compromised, particularly when the public services that they are facing do not understand, appreciate and respond to the situation that they are in. It is incumbent on Government and society to look after all of our citizens. If disability were associated only with a decline in advancing years, this would still be a serious and growing issue in Ireland. However, that is not the case. It is an issue for many people from birth right through the life cycle. Public transport has a responsibility to make sure that people can have easy access to buses, trains and trams. That is what I, the members of the DFI and the organisations and people here have and are continuing to work to achieve.

An interesting point for all Members of the Dáil is that each Deputy represents about 4,000 people with disabilities. That is not seen every day but it is a useful statistic. Adding about a third of that number gives the number of carers that are in Ireland as well. The initiative from this committee is about bringing a greatly needed sense of urgency to this issue. People with disabilities do not have their basic right to free movement. That unlocks so many things. I asked the committee at the start to think about the frustration of a bus or a train not turning up because of industrial action or something happening. That is minimal compared with the routine frustration of people with a whole range of disabilities. They are never in a position to feel confident that the public service will be there.

There a number of areas that I am not going to go into now. They are in my paper. Others can speak to the various issues experienced by people who are blind and visually impaired, deaf and hard of hearing, wheelchair users and people with mobility impairment, and also that area of autism and the need for quiet spaces and more time. These are all issues and they go across every aspect of public transport provision. There is not one area. Let me draw to a close by naming a couple of things. I will give one example.

It is one of many. For instance, Irish Rail insists that people with free travel passes who wish to reserve a seat pay €5 per journey each way even though the Oireachtas is underwriting the cost of the journey by providing a free transport pass. If someone without a free travel pass wants to book a seat, he or she faces no extra cost. That is a blatant infringement not only of fair play but also of the regulations we have through the EU. Accessible public transport requires a thoughtful and welcoming approach from all staff involved. Training and an insistence on standards of customer service are crucial. An embarrassing apology and expressing the hope that something will not happen again is not a response. The response is a working service. The remit of this committee includes tourism and it is important to note that accessible public transport and public spaces are assets to our tourism product.

The following is irksome. Where non-State transport providers have been licensed by the State to provide public transport, they must provide the same access and compliance that is required of the public operators. During the recent strike by Bus Éireann, I raised an issue, albeit I should probably say "Senator Dolan raised an issue" at the committee. It related to the service from Clonmel to Dublin and on to Dublin Airport. Bus Éireann was removing its fleet and saying the private operator had sufficient capacity. The Minister, departmental officials and the National Transport Authority, which is the regulator, said there was sufficient capacity to meet the need. Not one of the privately operated buses was accessible for wheelchair users. What is worse, not one of them needed to be accessible. The State had licensed a private operator to provide a public service and did not expect the same from that operator as it expected from the public provider. We were told publicly that there was no diminution in service for the people using that route. If it was for any of us who are in this room today, there was no diminution of service; there was no service. That is a critical issue and I feel strongly about it.

All operators whether public or private, must have effective and efficient complaints systems. The National Transport Authority must, to put it nicely, be in a position to ensure that learning and remediation follow complaints. I dealt with a young 20-year old woman who is finishing in college and who needs to come from County Cavan to Dublin on a regular basis. She has gone through primary, post-primary and three years of a four-year degree in Dundalk. In fewer than 20 weeks this year, she was let down 20 times even though she had phoned up. They were fed up of hearing from her because she was phoning up so often to book the 9.15 a.m. bus and the return journey that evening. She already had the burden of having to give notice two or three days in advance that she planned to travel from home to Dublin and back but the public provider still let her down routinely. We want her to get a job and have a life but where is she going? She cannot put her hand on her heart and tell a prospective employer that she will be at a meeting because she cannot depend on the public bus service every day of the week. That kind of thing is routine. When purchasing fleet, the transport authority must prioritise and insist on the acquisition of roll-on, roll-off coaches and buses.

I thank the Chairman for his tolerance. That is my opening statement. I am delighted that today there are so many people who can set out their frustrating lived experience of trying to use what is called "public transport" in Ireland.