Mr. Dermot O'Leary:

By and large, despite a few blips along the way, industrial relations interactions between the trade unions and the company have worked for generations. That is how we do our business and that approach has stood the test of time. There was no consultation with workers.

The legislation, which I know the Chairman has read, refers to "relevant persons". It does not mention bus drivers, inspectors or train drivers, whereas it mentions the National Transport Authority. The NTA has a central role to play, yet it is not on the pitch. It is very good at sending mystery shoppers out on buses to observe driver behaviour and see if buses are clean and so on but it has not been very good at being proactive on this issue. It is mentioned in the legislation.

I would like to make one other point. There was an attempt last week to drive a wedge between the Garda representatives bodies and the NBRU. That did not work because while consultation has been glaringly lacking in this area, there is no lack of consultation between the NBRU and the Garda representative bodies. We interact regularly, as proved last week when the Garda representatives issued a statement indicating that gardaí had no direct role in policing this legislation. That is also the position of the NBRU.

Legislation on fare collection was changed many years ago. Contrary to popular myth, it is not the responsibility of a bus driver to insist on a person paying a fare. That was done away when the two man operation became a one man operation. It was done to protect the safety of bus drivers and avoid conflict. Having fought long and hard on this issue for 30 years, we were not going to stand by and allow the reintroduction of confrontation with customers.