Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

From what the Minister said, one would swear this happened out of the blue over the past couple of days. The Minister talked about further measures. He talked about how the DAA has committed today to another 100 staff being employed. Back in March, we had a problem. The travelling public would have expected that the Minister, who is responsible for transport and aviation and part of the Government that signed off on a redundancy package for 1,000 staff which has left that airport at a point at which we cannot guarantee that passengers will not miss their flights this weekend, would have taken a hands-on approach at that point. The fact the Minister is telling us today that the DAA is committing to employ in the future another 100 staff shows us that the Minister has not been dealing with this issue effectively and that he has been asleep at the wheel. Assurances were given last week that we would not see the chaotic scenes that happened at Dublin Airport and yet they materialised. As the Minister for Transport, if we see those scenes again, will he hold those individuals at DAA accountable? Will they continue to be in their positions? Will the Minister explain to the Irish public why his Government signed off on a redundancy package that was completely and utterly unacceptable?

See this speech in context