Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I can look at the cancellations: the 7.30 a.m. 103 service from Dublin to Ratoath; the 8.40 a.m. from Ratoath to Dublin; the 8.25 a.m. 109 from Dunshaughlin to Dublin; and the 7.42 a.m. NX from Dublin to Navan. Those were all cancellations this morning, which is, unfortunately, par for the course. Every one of those buses is full. There are 80 or 60 people. When those buses are cancelled, it means the next one is not fit to take the number of people there and we end up with people standing at bus stops and frustrated with their experience of the public transport system.

This is one of the big issues and frustrations I hear about from people. The tool that is available to us is parliamentary questions. Bus Éireann will say that it has a performance efficiency rate of 96%. That really offends people because it does not reflect their experience. Some of those who use bus services irregularly will see lots of vehicles on routes. This issue relates to people who organise their lives, their working day and their working week around public transport services. Those services are not nearly as reliable as they need to be. The Minister of State provided an example. Because double-decker buses were not running on the relevant routes for a number of months, those routes were awarded to private providers that use coaches. As a result, there was a reduction in capacity in real terms. In what ways are the Minister of State and the NTA holding bus providers to account? Have fines been issued? Are there commitments in respect of approvals?

There are a number of good private providers, such as Ashbourne Connect, for example, that have been affected by the fare reductions on PSO services. These providers are running viable services, filling a gap and meeting demand. They tell me that because people are voting with their feet as a result of the fare reductions, there have reduced numbers on their services. In the meantime, people are shifting over to services that cannot meet the level of demand. I have asked this question at a number of fora. Is consideration going to be given to fairness across the public and private services in terms of fare reductions, specifically the 20% fare reduction?