Noel Rock (Dublin North West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this morning's report and the mention in The Irish Timesof a north link proposal. I welcome the clarity that is beginning to be brought to this issue. I welcome that the NTA has followed the suggestion that I made in this Chamber and, last year, in the committee to resolve the south side impasse that had been bogging this project down.

My first choice is for the project to proceed as is from Sandyford to Swords as the NTA set out and as the Minister has argued for in public. It is a good and worthy project, a good investment and a great legacy project for the Minister to attach his name to. However, it is clear to me and, I presume, the Minister that the south side squabble and the endless succession of unsolicited, uncosted and untested alternative routes that have been put forward by all parties and none mean that this project is unlikely to proceed in a timely manner. Accordingly, our options are: to proceed with the project in two phases, which I suggested last year, and commence the badly needed and long overdue metro north element first; and to assess the various alternative routes set forth by the Opposition, thereby certainly delaying the badly needed and long delayed metro beyond 2027. I cannot understand why parties are proposing something that would effectively shaft the north side, which has been promised the metro for three decades, and I hope that the Minister will not accept it. A third option is to run the risk of no metro project at all, which is the least desirable option.

I am running out of time, so I will keep my first question to the Minister simple.

Given the report in the Irish Independentthat the Minister sought and had a crisis meeting with the NTA and given the report in The Irish Timeswhich details that the proposal which will come before the public mirrors my suggestion that the northside project proceed first, can the Minister confirm this is his current understanding of the forthcoming proposal? If not, can he confirm what the forthcoming proposal from the NTA is?

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