Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will start, as the Chair has done, by recognising the tragic loss of two young people near Askeaton the night before last. Our first thoughts when it comes to the Limerick, Shannon and Clare region are about the horrible consequences of those road fatalities and injuries for the families of the people who we have lost. We must focus on that in everything we do.

The Chair is right that we need to recognise that the national planning framework, NPF, shows us the right direction because it is about balanced regional development, compact development and, critically, decarbonised development. The national planning framework was very well written in setting some of those key priorities. Limerick and the mid-west region, and particularly Limerick city, need to significantly expand if this is not just to serve the people of the mid-west but the whole country. We will all benefit from better balanced regional development and transport has a key role in that regard.

What the Chair said about the Connecting Ireland bus services is absolutely true. It is not just about the city, but also about the towns and villages. I was only speaking with someone recently who told me about the service in Kilmallock-Askeaton-Cappamore and in that area, which has seen a dramatic increase. The overall numbers in the TFI Local Link services in the Limerick-Clare region have gone up from approximately 28,000. The best base year to compare with is 2019, because the Covid-19 pandemic is taken out of it. It has gone up from 28,000 to 178,000. That is a fivefold increase and that is happening right across the country where we have introduced new services. It shows there is an underlying public demand for public transport. When we provide it, it exceeds the expectations that are shown in the modelling, because there has been an under-provision. We need to continue to see that.

In terms of meeting our climate targets, we must focus on those sorts of journeys that are over longer distances, where there is a relatively higher carbon content because of the distance travelled. If they can switch - and we can compare this to an urban journey, which is typically shorter - that would have a real potential benefit for decarbonising.

As the Chair knows, and I agree with him, the development in Limerick has to be around the existing rail network. In the Department of Transport, we have a very good investment framework, which is called the national investment framework for transport in Ireland, NIFTI. It highlights the need to use existing assets. It would be very expensive to build a new rail line. We can look at what is happening in the UK with the High Speed 2, HS2, which is a new rail line from London to Manchester and Birmingham. It is really expensive and difficult when you are building new rail lines.

When you have existing rail lines that you can bring back to life or on which you can increase the frequency of services, you can do that much quicker, and it is much cheaper and more effective. That is what we need to do in Limerick, and it is about all four approaches to Limerick. It is about looking at that Ennis line and including a rail link to Shannon but more immediately, urgently and definitely, to build a station in Moyross so that you see compact development in the Moyross area. This is close to Thomond Park and the university of the Atlantic, or the university of Munster - I can never get all of my new university names right.