Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Terence Flanagan and his colleagues for sharing their time. I welcome the Bill. I hope the amalgamation of the RPA and the NRA will save money. Over the years we have seen amalgamations and suggested amalgamations of agencies, accompanied by promises of considerable savings and change. However, we never really get a chance to examine the impact of these changes, whether the savings were achieved and whether the amalgamation and integration really happened seamlessly.

The RPA oversaw the introduction of the Luas and other fascinating and good developments for the country. All of its functions will now be transferred to the NRA and they will become one authority. All land currently vested in the RPA will move to the NRA without any conveyance. I have not had many issues with the NRA in recent years. I had many battles with it concerning motorways, on which it did a fine job in the main. However, it was pretty ruthless in dealing with people regarding CPOs and the powers it had. It was very hard to deal with it when it reached the stage of introducing a notice to treat. I understand that CPOs are necessary in some cases, but I felt they were used crudely and excessively. In some cases we ended up paying considerably above the odds for parcels of land and in other cases not enough. Those worst affected were the people living adjacent to the motorway, just as we will now have people living adjacent to the proposed power lines if the project happens. They may not be in any line of vision, or the land may not be touched, but they have to live with constant noise and they are affected. They got no hearing, good, bad or indifferent.

The RPA has been in existence for a long time and has done a considerable amount of work, some of it very good. Section 20 of the Bill provides that the chief executive of the new agency will be accountable to the Committee of Public Accounts and to the Houses of the Oireachtas, which is very important. Heretofore, as with the HSE, we keep getting the answer that an item is a matter for the NRA and the Minister has no function. That was something the Government inherited from the previous Government. I railed against it many times during the term of the previous Government, because it was wrong that even though was dealing with such big projects, involving vast amounts of money and affecting people's livelihoods, it was not accountable to the Oireachtas, with the line Minister just passing matters back to the NRA.

I often found it difficult to get answers from the NRA. Many of the motorways went through County Tipperary. I could never believe how it was allowed to design, plan and construct a motorway from the Border to Cork, which is a fabulous road, without proper service areas. They are coming now incrementally afterwards, but they should have been part and parcel of that project. It was unfair and unsafe. How did the Health and Safety Authority and other agencies stand over forcing people to drive these roads without any proper facilities to stop and rest? Imagine being the parent of a small child, as I know the Minister of State is, and trying to travel those roads. It was disgraceful that the NRA was allowed to bulldoze them through without having integrated service areas at least every 40 or 50 miles. They are coming now in places and there are planning applications. People in my constituency are looking to build another one but they are not having much success.

They should have been built initially.

There was a difficulty on the M8 last year. The contractor had to come back a few years ago to redo it but there is a problem on part of it in my constituency, south of Cahir. There is continuous ponding to the extent that there are yellow warning signs up warning that the road is dangerous in wet conditions. That is outrageous on a new motorway. The contractor, with whom I worked and whom I respected, should not have been allowed to walk away from that. It should not have been signed off. I think he had to maintain it for only a year. It is treacherous. Cars are overturned, the emergency services are called out and it will be only a matter of time before there are fatalities. Water is pooling, which causes aquaplaning. This is a new motorway. I am sure the Deputies who travel here from Cork see that for themselves. It is treacherous. There have been too many accidents on it. I have contacted the engineering section of the South Tipperary County Council, which does investigation after investigation. It is a newly built motorway and it should have been drained properly. It is not acceptable and it is dangerous. No one is being held accountable. Worse, the contractor, who in the main did a good job, should have repaired that bit of the motorway, where the work is faulty, at the sections north of Cahir and the Mitchelstown junction. I do not have their numbers with me but everyone knows where they are because flashing lights alert them to the fact that this is a newly constructed motorway.

Previous speakers have mentioned that the roadside is unkempt. There is litter at the rest areas, which is not the fault of the NRA. Filthy people decide to pollute it because they will not take away their rubbish. At the rest points there is not even a place to stand. If one stops for a rest one needs some kind of shelter to stand in and maybe have a cigarette. I do not smoke but one might want to eat a bar of chocolate, have a cup of tea or stretch one’s legs to get some fresh air. There is nothing like that to restore one if one is tired. There is nothing there, just a bare slip road, no shelter of any kind and no rubbish bin provided. There is an issue between the county council and the NRA as to who maintains it. That does not matter. Surely if people have rubbish they are entitled to dispose of it in a litter bin. I am not talking about household rubbish but what they would have after eating a take-away.

I condemn out of hand the building of tunnels that are too low. In this country we are in line with everything in Europe and everything has to satisfy European laws, yet we built tunnels that are lower than the European average, and now the NRA and the RSA and everybody else are forcing hauliers to lower their loads, making it less competitive for them to travel and more difficult to compete internationally. More important, it makes it less competitive for them to transport food and fodder from the east to the west, as we did successfully last year during the fodder crisis. It will add at least 33% to the cost of a load of fodder when it is scarce in March, April and May, due to the patent nonsense of somebody asleep at the wheel who allowed these tunnels to be designed and constructed too low. It beggars belief. Nobody is held accountable for it. Mention has been made of how good they are, which they are, but there are only a few of them and they are all too low. The ordinary taxpayer, the farmer or the housewife who needs anything delivered has to pay the price. It is unacceptable. The Minister is talking about it. I ask my colleague from Tipperary, the Minister of State at the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Kelly, who is here today, to consider giving an exemption for the high loads. I am not talking about reckless or unsafe loads but about the three bales of silage or straw that are properly and adequately checked and tied.

The Minister of State is well aware that we have tried to get funding for the Tipperary town bypass. It is badly needed and has been promised for a long time. There have been several accidents at Duggan’s bends on the N24. That stretch of road from Pallasgreen to Cahir should be completed. It cannot be left on the back burner because it costs too much in economic terms and too many lives. One stretch of that road is at Duggan’s bends near Kilmoyler. There are only ten beds for the whole country in the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Dun Laoghaire, and two are occupied by victims of serious accidents at Duggan’s bends outside Cahir. These are two out of five acute beds. The council is doing its best to realign the road but there are problems with the surface, the acute bends and buildings. Something must be done before there are more fatalities. There have been many there over the decades. At the moment it is particularly dangerous. They tell us that after prolonged dry weather the material that comes off the tyres of the trucks makes it greasy. Cars are turning over. I appeal to the Minister of State to visit the road in the interests of safety.

See this speech in context