Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. It is good of him to come into the House to talk about this vital issue for everybody in the city of Dublin. The achievements the lists include the study commissioned in 2014 and 2015, the opening of the Luas cross-city service, the expanded heavy rail services as a result of the reopening of the Phoenix Park tunnel and the introduction of ten minute DART services. I was one of the people who lobbied for for many years for the new Luas service to Broombridge and was particularly involved, as the Acting Chairman knows, in lobbying to have the tunnel under the Phoenix Park reopened. For the Minister in some way to claim that he has some relationship with these achievements is rather grandiose and history does not support it. I am delighted that they have all been made and about the real time information application for Dublin Bus. It precedes the Minister's time in the Department. I am talking about his time in it, the fact that he seems to have no time at all to get involved in dealing with the slow strangulation happening in Dublin city centre which has a serious impact in places other than Dublin city in Fingal, south Dublin and Dún-Laoghaire Rathdown. Each of these council areas has seen huge population growth. They require more buses and train carriages, particularly on the Maynooth line, electrification to happen much earlier and the College Green issue to be addressed. The Minister has not told us what his response is as Minister to An Bord Pleanála's decision. I said the application had been made by Dublin City Council. What does the Minister propose to do about the mess that has become infinitely more complex as a result of An Bord Pleanála's decision? An Bord Pleanála states the plan has merit but talks about a lack of public transport services. We have added into this the issue of the BusConnects programme, a deeply flawed proposal, with the astonishing information that Jarrett Walker has been paid €615,000.

See this speech in context