Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)

I express my appreciation to the people who helped me to prepare the Fine Gael response to this Bill, in particular Angela Flanagan, Paul O'Brien and Nick Miller. I also compliment the Oireachtas Library on presenting a very balanced view of the issues involved.

I agree with the Minister on several points. It is 77 years since this legislation was changed and it is important that there is full and proper debate on the proposed changes now. The weakness in this, however, is that the Minister proposes to take Committee Stage of the Bill next week. I cannot understand why, after 77 years, we are rushing this through the House. I understand the Minister has a deadline of 1 December for the passage of the legislation. That does not add up. We in Fine Gael want more buses, more transparency about routes and the subsidisation of public service obligation, PSO, routes, more frequent buses, more routes and cheaper fares, all of which is possible. The rushing of the legislation does not contribute to a proper debate on some or all of these issues.

It is a wide-ranging Bill but I will try to deal with some of the issues as quickly as I can. We in Fine Gael fully support the principle of one regulation body for public transport in Ireland. When the Minister brought the DTA Bill to the House, I made it clear that we favour a national transport authority over a Dublin one. We oppose this Bill because it maintains a protective veil around CIE and does not offer any real competition in the Irish bus market. The proposed new licensing system states that Dublin Bus, Bus Éireann and Irish Rail are not subject to the new system as they will come under the direct award contract, that is, no competitive tendering. The Bill also allows the new national transport authority to renew contracts under direct award without necessarily being subject to the tendering process. As a result, if new public transport services are required, or when existing contracts come up for renewal, the new authority will be free to enter into new contracts with CIE companies without investigating whether other operators could provide a better service and-or require a lower level of subsidy.

This Bill represents a massive lost opportunity for the State to save on subsidised public transport. In 2008, CIE received a total grant to cover public service obligations and railway safety of €321 million. This is an annual State expenditure that could be dramatically reduced with competitive tendering.

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