Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)

In terms of this debate, I have never come across a more uninformed Minister of State. I am not being personal. We are talking about choice for consumers yet he chooses to misrepresent what I said as being an extreme view and as being in favour of complete deregulation, which is untrue. I would put the Minister of State on one side of the Berlin Wall, which featured on George Lee's television programme last night. The Berlin Wall is gone. The Minister of State is the old hat, the old thinking, the old politics, where there is no change, where he continues to sustain and maintain State companies and State monopolies, as the Labour Party does in this debate. We are on the other side of that wall, with the new thinking, the new modern State, the new choices.

There are over 1,800 private service providers of buses in this country. They have over 6,000 buses and employ over 6,000 people yet they are cut off by the Minister of State's Berlin Wall and will not be able to cross it due to this legislation. It is he who is the extremist in his backing of the "no change" mentality. It is he who is backing the question of State operation or direct reward to favoured companies.

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