Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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The representatives of TII and the NTA are very welcome to the committee. I have been listening with interest to everything that has been said. There are many things I could ask but many of them have been covered. I wish to ask the NTA about the roll-out of rural transport. What level of additional cost is required to make sure our fleets of buses, taxis or whatever have disabled access facilities? Ms O'Donnell said that 16% of taxis have been funded to date which suggests there is a long way to go. What type of funding do our guests get through grant aid and how much more do they expect they will need in the future to try to improve facilities? Ms O'Donnell said TII would like to do much more. What are our guests' targets for improving those facilities?

I come from the rural constituency of Galway East. We have many issues around rural transport and trying to get connectivity. The Local Link, based in Loughrea, is doing work. When we bring forward proposals, we find they are turned down because they are not viable. I often feel those proposals should be trialled on the basis that a service will be taken up if it is run. I also have a concern about the fact that some services between Galway and Limerick have been cut by Bus Éireann in the Gort area. Bus Éireann has taken out some of those services when we should be including more services if we want to get cars off the road so public transport becomes our main way of travelling. Does the NTA need more money in order to make sure our rural transport links are geared up to take care of people with disabilities, in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities?

We have a set a target of having so many electric cars on the road by 2030 and by 2050. We will be electrifying our rail fleet. We will also be doing things and setting targets as a part of climate action. What do our guests foresee will be needed in the design of our infrastructure to make sure that people with disabilities are not left behind? One of the things that comes to mind is the fact that cars and traffic will be silent when vehicles are electric. How do we deal with that in terms of alerting people that there are cars on the road or a train is coming if the engines are not running? I do not know what future planning has been done. We are talking about rolling out things and looking to see how they are working before we start implementing changes in the designs of our motorways and national primary and secondary routes to make sure that we will have a new type of vehicle on the road. How are we including those considerations in the future design of our roads? I feel that may not have been thought about but perhaps it has been.