Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputies for the passion with which they have represented this issue. Indeed, it is an issue I am also very passionate about. As the House knows, I come from a very rural part of the country.

I am probably one of the most rural Deputies in Leinster House. There will be change but not all change has to be seen as negative. Change can be very positive. In this case, change is necessary. It is unfortunate it was not addressed in the past by the previous Government. We need to look at how we can integrate services more. For example, I am working with the Minister of State with responsibility for training and skills to see how school bus services can work with rural transport. I have said publicly on many occasions that I do not understand why for many years, the reverse routes of school buses were not used as public transport routes for nine months of the year. It just makes sense. The buses are empty, drivers must drive them and diesel has to be burnt. There needs to be greater integration between the HSE and voluntary groups with regard to non-acute services.

A draft document was sent out that is dated but not set in stone. We are considering various different options such as looking at local authority roles and structures. We need greater integration but we also need greater coverage. There are swathes of the country with no possibility of rural transport services because they do not have an RTP, which is not fair on them. This has grown organically and has done very well. I spent this morning with the Meath Accessible Transport Project which does fantastic work. I visited most of the groups referred to by the Deputies and know many of the people who run them. They do brilliant work. This is a challenge. There is an awful lot of work involved and there will be change but I believe it will be positive change. We must look at how it will integrate with other public transport services. There are challenges relating to those who are fleet-owning as opposed to non-fleet-owning and those with Leader group involvement and those without. There is a range of issues involved, all of which must be and are being digested to come up with an optimum structure. We are trying to ensure rural transport has a secure and structured future because doing nothing is not an option. Doing nothing will see service drop and I am not prepared to see service drop in the future. I want to protect services and that is the intention of the plans we will draft as a Government.

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