Dáil debates

Tuesday, 9 November 2021

Regional Transport Infrastructure: Motion [Private Members]

 

7:10 pm

Photo of Michael Healy-RaeMichael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Sinn Féin for bringing this very important Private Members' motion. We are starting on the back foot when we have a Minister for Transport who says he does not like building roads. There is a massive increase in the cost of motoring and fuel is going close to €2 per litre, which is a frightening prospect because everything is reliant on roads in our country. I recently had a meeting with a number of car dealers in Kerry. A wise man attended that meeting and he is not young but I will not say he is old either; he is an experienced car salesman. He asked me if I would stand up inside in the Dáil and tell the Government that people cannot afford the electric cars they are being told to buy.

There is nothing in the world as efficient as a properly serviced and maintained diesel engine. That is a fact and I will argue that with any environmentalist. Any environmentalist who thinks he or she has a monopoly on protecting the environment does not. We are as concerned as anybody else about protecting the environment but we have the common sense to know that if you own a well-performing diesel engine it is rubbish and nonsense to think about getting rid of it to buy an electric car. We are after closing down a number of our ESB generating stations so our electricity is becoming scarcer and at the same time we are telling people to use more of it. If you own a diesel car the message should be to hold onto it, maintain it, change the oil in it and keep it running for as long as you can. You are doing better for the environment by doing that then by buying something for which the production of its battery is an enormous blow to the environment. That is a debate for another day.

I welcome the Macroom and Baile Bhuirne bypass and the future Listowel bypass. We definitely need a bypass for the Killarney bypass. Even though we have a Minister for Transport who does not like building roads, we will have to try to build those roads in spite of him and without him. We will do so because we are entitled to them. The same as the people in Dublin are entitled to a lot of things; we are entitled to these things in County Kerry as well. I thank the private taxi and bus operators who provide a service in County Kerry and in rural Kerry, whether it is Tralee, Killarney, Killorglin, Cahersiveen, Listowel, Kenmare or Sneem, we have excellent people there providing those services. They are not public services; I am talking about private operators and I thank them for the business they conduct.

We are in a worrying time. Last week a lot of people would have turned in their graves. It is not for me to comment on what other political parties do but the leader of the country and of what we would call a one-time major political party came out and made a statement. He was accused of making a speech that could have been attributed to the Green Party and he said he took that as a good compliment. When the Taoiseach of the day comes out with a statement like that we are in worrying and disturbing times.

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