John Perry (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Broughan must agree that many people use free parking to park for the day. This is not good for business. The ideal for a business is that somebody comes in to do their business and only parks for an hour or two, leaving the parking space free then for someone else. However, if somebody parks for the whole day because it is free, that is not good for business. If we were to do due diligence and a business EIS on this, we would want to get people in and out and allow new cars in. This is what we want from the point of view of business. If I were a business operator in Howth, I would welcome a well-managed system that would allow better use of the car park rather than a system that allowed people to hog the parking for the whole day for free. From a business point of view, if I was a restaurant owner in Howth, I would not like to think a car was taking up a parking place all day, preventing my customer from coming in and having lunch. We should look at the issue from the point of view of business and value for money.

See this speech in context