Mr. Tim Gaston:

Members will have seen this morning in the newspapers a statement on a possible movement to off-peak hours. It is not in our immediate plans but we need to be aware that free travel funding has not increased very much, either to the CIE group of companies or the other operators. People are travelling during the peak hours, during which services are increasingly congested and reaching capacity in some places. Moving to off-peak would be one option to help to address the issue of peak travel and capacity issues. As I said, it is not something we are currently planning but it is a measure that might have to be taken depending on where we go in terms of funding and providing additional capacity. There is no doubt that this will be an ongoing problem because the number of people in the over-66 age bracket will increase quite dramatically over the next ten to 15 years. It is something that needs to be addressed. We welcome the fact that the discussion has at least been opened by the media commentary this morning.