Mr. Kenneth Spratt:

It is a point very well made.

With regard to electric vehicles and Garristown, I live close enough to Garristown. It is the case that people in north County Dublin and other rural areas around all of the cities in the country will need to use their private vehicles for some time to come. We want to try to get 960,000 electric vehicles out by 2030. There is a question as to how we incentivise. A scrappage scheme is something that can be considered further. Again, we have to make sure that we maximise value for money and that we assist those who need assistance but that we avoid assisting people who might not necessarily need that assistance and who, potentially, could buy their own vehicles without Government aid.

The point on development plans is very interesting. What we have at present is predominantly road-based development, whereby many houses and commercial entities follow the roads. To be perfectly honest, many roads have many political champions. Sustainable mobility has less political championing. What we will try to achieve is having transport-led development, whereby development, whether housing or commercial operations, would evolve around sustainable mobility projects and public transport projects. This is something of which we are very mindful. This is not to say that in the example the Deputy gave we are ignoring the fact people still need their vehicles. Our preference is that if they are using vehicles that they are electric vehicles.

With regard to the technical impediments to the youth travel card, this was something raised with us quite close to the budget. We now have to put on our thinking caps to see how we get it out to as many people as possible aged between 19 and 23 throughout the country and not just those who are in cities. This is something we are working on along with colleagues in the transport agencies. There are some issues with the supply of the cards, which are related to the chip industry, the global demand for chips and the shortage of supply. This is another challenge we will have to grapple with. I think I have touched on all of the issues the Deputy has raised.