Imelda Munster (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

On Monday, the workers at Bus Éireann will embark on an all-out strike in an attempt to protect their livelihoods and to protect our public transport network right across the State. They will do so in the face of the refusal by the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Shane Ross, to do his job. They will do so in the face of the determination of management and Government to burden workers with the financial responsibility for this crisis, which was created by Government policy and mismanagement.

The Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport and the Minister's Government are putting his privatisation agenda ahead of the needs of the citizens of this State. The plan is the same here as it is with his approach to other vital services such as health, housing and education. The steps are the same in every case - starve the service of investment, implement draconian cuts, foster disputes and inconvenience the public to the point of anger. The model of public ownership is then blamed and the workers are penalised in order to create a false justification for privatisation. The destruction of our public services is an inside job.

The Minister's Government and the Minister, Deputy Ross, are responsible for the shambles that exists in Bus Éireann. The Minister, Deputy Ross, has shown a complete lack of leadership on this issue. The Government is happy to sit on the sidelines and let the chaos unfold. The Taoiseach said this week that both he and the Cabinet fully support the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, the same Minister who acts as if his job description had been written by H.G. Wells - the Minister, Deputy Shane Ross, the invisible man of Irish politics.

The Government's privatisation agenda is very clear, but the ordinary workers of Bus Éireann see right through it, as do the people living in rural Ireland. Bus Éireann workers will not allow the Government, the Minister, Deputy Ross, or company management to destroy their livelihoods, dismantle the services they worked so hard to provide and then blame them for the mess that the Government created. It is not an easy thing to vote for strike. Sinn Féin commends those workers on their brave decision. We understand the reasons for that decision. We understand the inflammatory proposals that were put before the workers and we stand fully behind them as they prepare to stand on a picket line next Monday.

The communities of rural Ireland know well by now that the Government is no friend of theirs. The Minister's plan to destroy our public transport network further underlines the great isolation being imposed on people living in rural communities by the decisions taken by his party over the past six years. They will now wonder how they will get to work, to hospital appointments or to visit family. The message to rural Ireland is very clear. The Government has abandoned rural Ireland.

My question is very simple. Will the Minister demand, not ask, urge or suggest, but demand that the Minister, Deputy Ross, get involved in a practical way to see a resolution, or even that he allow his Department to get involved?

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