Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)

I thank all those who contributed to the debate. As speakers made a diverse range of comments, I shall confine my closing remarks to issues pertinent to the Bill.

Several Deputies pointed out that the Bill had been published late in the day and that late legislation was not good legislation. I accept some criticism in this regard and apologise to the House that the Bill has come so late in the day. It was initially believed the matter could be addressed by secondary legislation or regulations, but it became apparent to the Department only a few weeks ago that primary legislation would be required. This is good legislation and I have full confidence in the ability of the Dáil and the Seanad to scrutinise it for any errors that may have been made.

The regulations will apply directly from 4 December. The Bill is not required to give effect to the majority of the provisions, but I will shortly be introducing regulations to provide in the normal way for penalties for non-compliance with EU regulations. In finalising the national regulations we received legal advice that a small number of issues required primary legislation, hence the need for the Bill.

A number of Deputies raised the issue of cabotage, which is worthy of debate in its own right. My general view is that the current system of cabotage across the European Union is daft. I would prefer to see a single European market for haulage, as is the case in aviation with the open skies directive. Cabotage is specifically covered by EC Regulation 072/2009 and will be complemented by national regulations which will set out offences and clear penalties. While cabotage is not a matter for this Bill, cabotage offences will attract significant fines under the national regulations. The levels are being discussed with the Office of the Attorney General to ensure they are proportionate. The cabotage provisions cannot be changed because they are set out in EU legislation.

The application of regulations in any member state is a matter for the state concerned. I recognise the difficulty in enforcing cabotage offences on out-of-state hauliers if they breach their cabotage entitlements here, and I will revisit the matter in a road transport Bill next year. I am conscious of the desire of the industry for clarity about cabotage in the United Kingdom. My Department has engaged in bilateral discussions with the UK authorities with a view to determining whether guidelines can be drawn up for operators. Members may be interested to learn that the opening up of the entire EU market has been set out as European Commission policy in its transport White Paper No. 2011-22. I support this objective, but the key issue is enforcement of regulations. Enforcement is much stronger in the United Kingdom than it is in Ireland. The UK authorities have powers to impound a vehicle or turn it around but similar powers do not appear to be provided safely in Irish legislation. This is an issue we may need to address in other legislation next year.

A number of Deputies spoke about the difficult business environment, fuel costs and the carbon tax. As these are matters for the Minister for Finance, I will not comment on them in the context of this debate. The Bill will not involve additional administrative costs or burdens for operators.

The argument for licensing own-account operators is not the same. It is a very different issue when somebody is essentially carrying their own goods between their own distribution centres and their own retail outlets. It is very different from a haulier for hire or reward. However, as vehicle standards and driver and safety issues also apply to the own-account sector, the argument has been made for some kind of registration or permit system. The RSA has included this question in its recent consultation on commercial vehicle reform and I would be interested in the outcome of that consultation. As Northern Ireland authorities have recently decided to extend regulations to this sector, we will give consideration to the matter.

Deputy Dooley spoke about exemptions. The additional exemptions he mentioned are already provided for in existing Acts and do not need to be repeated in this legislation. They are and will continue to be exempted.

Sinn Féin Members raised the issue of political prisoners and take the view that offences covered by the Good Friday Agreement that were politically motivated and occurred before the signing of the Good Friday Agreement should be exempted from the Bill. My impression is that I do not agree with the amendment. The offences that are specifically mentioned in the Bill include murder, manslaughter, money laundering, smuggling and rape. I do not know how often murder, manslaughter, money laundering, smuggling and rape are politically motivated. The principles that follow the Good Friday Agreement are that people guilty of these offences may get early release but those convictions are not expunged. No amnesty has been provided for those offences. If something were to happen on those lines, it would need to be a broad Government policy decision to ignore, waive or expunge those offences rather than in this legislation ignore these serious offences just for road transport issues. Anyone applying for a licence can apply to the District Court and can make a case there as to why the politically motivated murder or rape should still allow him or her to have a licence. I would be interested to see how such cases might progress.

Deputy Ross spoke about Bus Éireann. Of course Bus Éireann and Dublin Bus each need a licence. They are licensed on the same basis as private operators and are enforced in the same way as private operators. The Deputy should not be surprised if Bus Éireann, Dublin Bus or any public bus company found itself prosecuted by the RSA in coming months. His comments on Irish Rail were not particularly relevant to this legislation which is road transport legislation and not rail transport legislation. I know the Deputy has a great interest in the Baker Tilly report. The offences and corruption uncovered by that report were detected by an internal investigation in Iarnród Éireann. The organisation is a very different organisation than it was then and now has a new management team, most of whom are not even from this country. We also have a new management structure with new chairs taking on that role. If any error occurred regarding the Baker Tilly report, it was that the Minister at the time was not informed about the issue or what was going on. I have certainly made it abundantly clear to the new chairwoman and chairman that I, as Minister, want to be informed of any such issues and they agreed that should be the case.

Deputy Ross also expressed some concerns about the powers being afforded to the Minister in this regard and I have some sympathy with his view. In most cases now the Minister is not the licensing authority and Ministers do not hand out licences in the way that I do in road transport. As part of the general review of legislation we might need to consider whether the licensing function should be given to another authority.

Several Deputies raised the issue of unlicensed operators and I strongly agree with what they said on the issue. There are two good things about this legislation. First, it increases the maximum fine from €6,000, which is not a lot, to €500,000, which is a lot. Second, for the first time the consignor or customer can be held liable for hiring an operator who is not licensed.

The issue of colour coding existing speed limit signs was raised. We would need to think about that. Speed limits change over time and it would be a considerable job to change all the road signs on a motorway or road if speed limits were changed. The solution might be to have more speed signs rather than incorporating a colour code on all the existing directional signs.

Deputy John Paul Phelan asked about ongoing investment in local and regional roads. Obviously the transport budget is very tight with virtually no money for new capital investment. The priority is maintenance and while we will struggle to do that, we should have enough money in coming years to have the roads maintained at least. There will also be some improvements in strategic local and regional roads and also national secondary roads in tourist areas, involving removing dangerous bends and so on. However, these will be very small projects of €500,000 or €1 million with very little above that. The problem I face is that a large number of interest groups, including local authorities, county managers, Deputies, Senators and councillors, all want me to continue to spend lots of money on planning for projects that we cannot afford to build for perhaps ten or 20 years. I could do that but if I did so, it would be at the expense of maintenance and removing dangerous bends and so on, which would be a mistake.

Responsibility for commercial vehicle roadworthiness testing is being transferred to the Road Safety Authority. At the moment it is done largely by private sector operators and that will need to be regulated more tightly in future.

Deputy Tom Hayes spoke about bypasses. No new bypasses will be built in the State during the period of the Government, with the exception of Ballaghaderreen, which has now gone to tender, and perhaps something along the A5 route at some point in 2015 or 2016, but that will be it. More than €1 billion worth of road works are already in the pipeline and we might get started on them in 2017 or 2018, so there is very little point in adding any new projects to that pipeline. The Deputy made the very good suggestion that in towns, such as Tipperary, which need a bypass, we should try to develop interim plans for traffic management through those towns. The local authorities who know those towns well should draw up those plans and submit them to my Department or the NRA and we can see what can be done so long as they are genuinely low cost solutions.

The issue of the driver certificate of professional competence was raised. The driver CPC is entirely different from the road transport operator CPC. The driver CPC from the RSA is required to show that the driver has undergone regular training on how to drive large vehicles. The road transport operator CPC relates to how to manage a road transport business. The examination for this is focused on compliance with commercial and transport law and is not connected to driving per se. A road transport operator CPC is issued following the passing of an examination and lasts for life.

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