Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

With regard to amendment No. 7, the objectives of the DTA include the provision of a safe public transport system. It is a normal duty imposed on any provider of transport that the service should be provided in a safe manner. However, that is not the same as providing the DTA with a regulatory role with regard to safety, which would be the effect of amendment No. 7. I do not intend that the DTA should be granted a safety monitoring role in this Bill. It would not be a good idea to do so. That role should remain with the existing bodies, including the Road Safety Authority, the Railway Safety Commission, the Health and Safety Authority and so forth. All these bodies have a specific safety remit which extends to transport, in some circumstances. Giving the DTA, as well as those other agencies, a role in safety could have the opposite effect to that intended by the Deputy. It could cause confusion as to who is responsible for what in an emergency. I do not think a safety monitoring role is a good idea in that regard.

I know the motivation behind the amendment is a concern to ensure that safety is a priority and I assure the Deputy that I share that concern with him. The DTA will be obliged under the existing road and rail safety framework, including the various Road Traffic Acts, the Railway Safety Act, the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act and so forth, to meet obligations for the safety of workers and the public. That covers the issue more than adequately and, on that basis, I ask Deputy Broughan to withdraw amendment No. 7.

Amendments Nos. 8 and 67 propose to add to the Bill a very specific framework around the terms and conditions of employment. We had a very good debate on this issue on Committee Stage, discussing the pros and cons of it. During that debate, I explained to the committee that, arising from Towards 2016, the ten-year framework social partnership agreement, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment is preparing legislation to give effect to a range of measures to enhance employment rights and compliance issues. These include the introduction of the employment law compliance Bill 2008, which will overhaul the State's employment rights framework and a proposed employment law consolidation Bill to simplify and codify employment law spanning more than 60 years. I also referred to discussions taking place in the partnership talks on the implementation of part two of Towards 2016 in respect of pay, the workplace, employment rights and compliance. In the context of the provisions of Regulation (EC) No. 1370/2007 to which the Deputy referred, I have pointed to the fact that Article 4 of the new regulation provides for mandatory content in public service contracts. While Article 5 recognises that collective agreements between social partners may be in place in individual member states, it also provides for the protection of the rights of workers through the inclusion of the appropriate provisions in the tender documents and the public service contracts. Article 6 also provides for the inclusion of national quality standards in tender documents and public service contracts.

The concerns of the Deputy are met in large part by what we already have in the Bill. In an effort to address the concerns that inform those amendments, I introduced an amendment to section 48 on Committee Stage to require that the public transport service contracts contain requirements relating to applicable law in respect of pay and terms and conditions of employment. That amendment now forms part of that particular section.

Arising from concerns relating to the certification of transport operators, a new paragraph (n) introduces the requirement to hold the appropriate national or international road passenger operator's licence, RPTOL, in the case of contracts relating to public bus passenger services. RPTOLs are granted every five years and the application criteria relate to a range of issues such as professional competence, good repute and sound financial standing. In circumstances where the spirit, if not the letter, of the Deputy's amendment has been met and having amended the legislation in section 48 on Committee Stage, I ask the Deputy to withdraw his amendment.

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