Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)

If I understand the Minister correctly, under the 12-year plan, the actual net amount being provided in 2009 for smarter travel, of which the majority of Members of this House would be supportive, is only €6 million. The Minister announced last week that €4.5 billion would be available up to 2020, in addition to Transport 21. To most ordinary citizens that would appear to suggest an allocation of €400 million a year over the 12 years but we find out now that the allocation is a derisory €6 million.

The report outlines 49 actions but, unlike the road safety report, there are no deadlines so there is no pressure, no sense of measurement or targets. How is the modal move away from cars to be achieved? Will the Minister indicate why there are not targets or deadlines? How will the Minister and the transport stakeholders be held to account?

At the launch of the report the Minister indicated he envisaged the introduction of congestion charges in three years. Will he outline how he sees them being introduced, and what will happen this year? The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Gormley, wants more tolls and road pricing. Does the Minister support the introduction of those measures in 2009 and 2010? One of the most important outcomes of the report must be a fall in transport emissions but, again, there is no target in the report. The Minister, Deputy Dempsey, and the hapless Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Gormley, will achieve a reduction in transport emissions because the economy is contracting at a rate between 6% and 10%. That is the only reason the Minister will achieve anything.

I welcome the initiative on sustainable transport. The Minister appeared to suggest that Galway is the priority city for sustainable transport and that it would get significant additional resources for that purpose. Since that announcement we heard from the media that there would be a competition involving all the towns and cities in the country. Is Galway to become a sustainable city or is it not?

The move to a more sustainable form of transport is a kind of sick joke by the Minister in the context of the loss of 600 jobs and 300 buses in Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann. On the one hand the Minister produced a fancy report, which he dallied over for the past two years and at the same time he is slashing public transport and leaving commuters all over the country with reduced services, reduced frequencies and a much inferior transport system. Is the report not simply a joke?

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