Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

That is fair enough about the launch of the scheme.

The Minister outlined that she is providing additional money and so on but the reality is that in rural areas, coach operators operate a number of different varieties of transport, including school transport and so on. They supplement their income by doing different things. I know from contacts I have received that the tours they provide for do not stipulate that the coaches have to be less than five years old. They stipulate that they must be mechanically sound, safe, comfortable and things like that but there is not an age limit put on them. We are excluding an awful lot of operators from the operation of the scheme and from getting supports. They need support just like the big tour operators do. I am afraid this scheme has been developed for large tour operators and that what we are actually going to do is to push the small operators aside across the board. That is what I am afraid of, that is, that this crisis could end up as an opportunity for the big operators to consolidate and that the smaller operators will be squeezed out. The Minister needs to look at how the small operators can be supported as well. Perhaps a scheme could be designed particularly for them. If a small operator is using his bus 20% of the time for tourism, maybe there could be a grant for that 20% or something like that. That would recognise that they also have a vital role to play in the tourism sector and in developing it.

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