Dáil debates

Thursday, 7 October 2021

Saincheisteanna Tráthúla - Topical Issue Debate

Road Projects

4:05 pm

Photo of Éamon Ó CuívÉamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

May I ask for a full transcript of the Minister of State's response because I received only a precis of it? The Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, announced during the week a new process that is to be followed. It seems to have been designed as a clever way of stopping projects such as this. Can the Minister of State outline what that process will entail? In the case of a road, will the process be based on cars, heavy goods vehicles and buses that are fuelled by fossil fuels or, as will happen in the future, vehicles that are fuelled by hydrogen? Hydrogen will be produced in abundance in the west of because we will have so much renewable electricity. We are already looking at hydrogen fuelled and electric public transport in the region. Can the Minister of State outline how this new process will work out, what it will entail and the basis on which it will be decided? Is this just a new method by the Green Party to stop this project going ahead and to stymy, once again, the proper development not only of Galway city, but of the entire region west of the city that requires so much development?

My basic question is: what is really going on? What is the subtext to all of these new announcements? I notice there was no reference in the Minister of State's reply to the new layer of bureaucracy that is being added to the scheme. I know this was not added without a deadly purpose. I am trying to elicit whether this is a scheme by the Minister to make sure this project does not go ahead and will be strangled if or when it gets through the An Bord Pleanála process.

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.