Mr. Stephen Kent:

My personal view is that there are definitely possibilities for further integration. There are some talks going on in that regard, but it is not without caveats or criteria. There are issues that have to be addressed. This is what it comes back to. What does it mean if it was doing the school bus run and coming back? There would be issues to be addressed in terms of whether the driver is vetted, because it is for the school bus run not for a regular service? How would the ticketing be integrated? The Department of Education issues one ticket. How would we pick up the road passenger ticket? These issues are not insurmountable, but these are the things that we are trying to figure out in terms of the practicalities. Equally, when the NTA prescribes a service, typically, we want all of the services to be accessible, which they are; ideally a low-floor vehicle. They are things that have been gradually introduced. Even in Deputy Crowe's region, he will see types of vehicles that have been addressing that. There are things that will have to be addressed in terms of vehicle type, the driver, the ticketing that we would have to have and then there is some regulation attached to it because the school run is different to what may be prescribed for an operation by the NTA.

If Deputy Crowe can believe it, we used to do it years ago. Prior to 2009, Bus Éireann used to integrate a lot more services. We know it is possible. We are operating into two bodies. Those chats are now starting to happen. We see it with the level of demand that we are having. If we are going to meet the demand, we have to figure out how we are going to optimise and maximise the available resources. There are definitely opportunities. Connecting Ireland will provide some of that.