Gerry Horkan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Ms Armstrong noted that there are passengers they know are persistent offenders. They might see a person at a stop and think trouble is coming. Mr. Murphy mentioned that there is no age barrier to this kind of behaviour. People could be starting at eight, nine, ten, 11 or 12 throwing rocks or acting the eejit. It needs to be tackled at the persistent offender level because it is probably 0.1% of the travelling population causing 40% or 50% of the trouble, or maybe more. My grandfather is a long time dead. He was a bus conductor in Wigan for a year when he was just out of school. In those days we were used to bus conductors, and when I was growing up there were bus conductors. They are obviously not there now. One-person-operated, OPO, services are almost 40 years old now. When travelling late at night on a route that is not especially populated with passengers you are vulnerable, and we acknowledge that. I have spent the past couple of days at the transport meetings. People in Dublin Bus and other companies are proud of what they are trying to do. They are proud of their staff, their new technology and the new buses and rail carriages. From the management side, it is not in their interest to allow any level of public disorder. We need better engagement from unions, management and policing authorities.