Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The programme for Government contains a commitment to balanced regional development, in particular the delivery of sustainable transport solutions across the regions. Those transport solutions need to be sustainable from an environmental and economic perspective. We are making fundamental decisions as to how we invest in rail infrastructure, in particular in the west of Ireland over the coming years.

We are doing that without all the information we require. The former Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Shane Ross, commissioned a report on the viability of extending a rail service from Athenry to Claremorris on the long disused western rail corridor. He did not succeed in publishing that, despite the fact that it was presented to Irish Rail over a year ago by the consultants involved, which were paid a significant amount of money to carry out that review. With a new Minister for Transport in place, we have still not seen the findings of that report. If we are to make those investments we need to do so armed with all of the information necessary.

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