Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour) | Oireachtas source

It is incredible.

I will speak a bit about Dublin Airport and it is fair that I do I, but I will try to mix it in with the title that has been dropped on us at late notice. We are talking about sustainable transport. We are talking about the airport. This crisis has been multifactorial and has been years in the making. It will require a turning point as to where the airport is going and this should be it. It needs to become a good employer again. It needs to become an employer that will hire staff on good wages and good terms and conditions. Staff should again be proud to work there.

The airport is now asking the Commission for Aviation Regulation, CAR, for an increase in airport charges to fund its development plans which have sustainable transport elements to them. It wants to build solar farms to help out with the airport. It wants to move to become properly carbon neutral. It wants the metro to be linked up, as we all do. It wants to reduce the number of cars using the airport. It wants more public transport using the airport. It wants to make all these changes. How can it with any credibility come to the Minister, any future Minister or the CAR and say, "We need more money. Give us your money. It will be in safe hands with us. We know what to do with it."? Its credibility has been absolutely shot.

It is a massive problem because we need an airport that functions. Air travel will be here to stay. We are an island nation; we need air travel. Air travel and aviation need to play their role on the climate agenda. This has always been a charge against the Minister. He is a Green Party member. His credentials on climate issues are unquestionable. However, there is a sense that he does not want to get involved in the airport because it conflicts with that. That is the sense that is out there. He needs to lead on this. Privately he needs to drive what needs to be done in aviation.

The lever of the pandemic was pulled very quickly cutting many staff from good secure employment, to be replaced, as the Minister is being replaced now, with other staff who are not on the same pay or terms and conditions which is outrageous. Trade unions and those of us on the left warned about this for years and it has happened.

I will raise some other issues while I have the floor. Nationwide transport fare reduction has generally been a good thing, but it has been unequally applied. I raise an issue highlighted to us by activists in Labour Youth and other activists in Wexford and the south-east region. Young people travelling to college or work from Wexford, Wicklow and Kildare have been excluded from the fare reduction. The reduction has not applied to Expressway or Wexford Bus and unfortunately many students and low-paid workers use these services to get to college or their workplace, be it in the capital or their surrounds. They feel disenfranchised and excluded from this. The Government has trumpeted this as a massively good thing. It is good for those to whom it applies, but it does not apply equally and those outside Dublin and in rural areas are suffering.

The 90-minute journey Leap card fare is also a good thing but some wrinkles need to be ironed out on a regional basis. In north County Dublin, rail services to and from Balbriggan and Skerries are excluded even though Rush and Lusk and Donabate, which are not on the DART line but on the commuter line, are included. As they are within the 90 minutes, it seems a line has been drawn in an arbitrary fashion. This could be easily resolved. Common sense demands that it would be resolved. Those in the outer Dublin area, in Fingal, South County Dublin or the west should be included in the 90-minute fare because they can take 90-minute journeys.

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