Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)

——the expansion of that line. I was open in giving my views to the Deputy earlier. I will raise the matter and I have no problem with that. The Deputy made a reasonable point earlier and I will come back to him about it on my next Question Time. I will try to expand on that point and see what the precise position is.

I do not accept the Deputy's suggestion that the expansion and widening of the M50 will achieve nothing. That is not the case. The Deputy forgets that people in this country, like people in other countries, choose the car as their primary mode of transport regardless of whether we like it. There has been huge growth in car usage in Ireland but Ireland is still below the EU average in terms of car ownership. One can only presume, therefore, that the number of cars on our roads will continue to grow.

We are trying to do two things. We are trying to create massive improvement in public transport, which the taxpayer has been funding for the past five or six years, and at the same time provide massive improvement in road infrastructure. The difficulty is that neither can be done overnight. There is a lead-in time and a number of years will pass before all the elements are in place to resolve the issues. That is a simple fact. Neither I nor anybody in any other country has encountered a solution whereby one can parachute something in overnight and solve the problems.

The taxpayer has been funding the huge investment in public transport and road infrastructure and will continue to do so for at least another ten to 15 years. Recognising that challenge, the Government has provided, for the first time in the history of the State, a ten year envelope to do that work.

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