Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am delighted to speak on the Road Traffic (Amendment) Bill 2017. Any fatality on the roads is one too many. I send my profound sympathies to those families who have lost loved ones. I say that from the bottom of my heart. I have met families whose family members were either killed or injured on the roads due to drink driving.

Members raise issues here which are of significant concern to their constituents. We are elected by our constituents and we have to make up our own minds on legislation and deal with it when it comes before us. However, we are treated by colleagues here and elements of the media as pariahs when we raise concerns, whether on the eighth amendment, road traffic legislation, the failing agricultural economy and the fodder crisis. There is this kind of disdain shown to us and we are told to move on from this because it is distant. We are a small island country off the west coast of Europe that depends on the agricultural economy and the whole fabric of rural Ireland.

The Minister, Deputy Shane Ross, has been a good friend of mine over the past nine years. We have had many a robust debate on this Bill. When he came to Tipperary on his way back from west Cork one evening, my daughter, Máirín, and I took him to look at a bridge in Aherlow. We took the Minister in my daughter's car for a short drive along 18 miles. We showed him eight pubs along the route which had been closed. I am not speaking on behalf of the vintners. I have met the vintners once on this Bill but we meet lobbyists all the time. Every pub pays rates, income tax and staff wages.

Deputy Harty is more qualified than I am to speak about the impact of alcohol and meals on people. However, in many rural areas, the pub is the last place standing. Many rural areas do not have other venues such as a community hall or a hotel. It is unfortunate that many presentations after matches are made in public houses. However, it can be the only place available. Pubs do a great service. Some of them have kept lounges which are used occasionally on which they pay rates. They are maintained to a reasonable standard for functions such as after funerals. Funerals in rural areas allow the community to come together to empathise and sympathise with a family over a loss. It shows how the community spirit and meitheal is still alive and well.

I was involved in the talks for the programme for Government. One point we drove home every day in the talks, which the Minister sought with his Independents group, was the rural-proofing of legislation. It has got worse now, however. We were told by the then Taoiseach during those talks that every Bill would be rural-proofed but none of them is. If this Bill were rural-proofed, there would be a wide range of provisions in it to address these rural concerns.

The Bill's explanatory memorandum states:

The Bill will remove the penalty points option in certain cases and thereby ensure that all drivers intercepted while driving over the legal alcohol limit will receive a disqualification. In place of the current three penalty points provided in these cases, the Bill will introduce a three-month disqualification period.

The car is a vital mode of transport in rural areas. Fianna Fáil has suggested amendments. The Rural Independent Group will also be tabling amendments. We feel this Bill is too harsh and has not been rural-proofed.

One day Deputy Heydon threw out a figure of €1 million for rural transport schemes. I was a founder member of Ringalink in south Tipperary, Carlow and Kilkenny. I know the costs involved and €1 million would not even cover a feasibility study, never mind putting on buses in rural areas. We tried to provide a Christmas bus service for four villages, but it did not work out, even with the best will in the world. Deputy Heydon's €1 million was only a sop to appease people's concerns about this legislation.

Rural areas are hammered every day of the week and are abandoned. The latest OECD figures show that 52% of all economic activity in this country is inside the Pale and Dublin. That is not good or healthy. If the unfortunate homeless people in this city had a car, they would sleep in it. However, we see people in different rural towns sleeping in cars. Rural Ireland is sadly forgotten.

Cad a dhéanfaimid feasta gan adhmad? Tá deireadh na gcoillte ar lár. The Minister's Irish may not be great. At the rate I speak it, he might not understand it.

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