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

It is the third time I have had to raise this issue in this House. I keep getting the same answers. I have also tabled parliamentary questions. The first thing we have to recognise is that transport costs take a disproportionate amount of islanders' incomes. In many cases, they need to keep two cars – one on the island and one on the mainland. Only two islands have roll-on roll-off, ro-ro, ferries. Every time they go to the mainland, they have to take public transport. The rest of us do not, but they do.

It was in recognition of this that back in 1997 I introduced subsidised ferry services over a very short number of years to virtually every island off the coast. Until then, there was a hodgepodge of subsidised services, but none of the non-Irish speaking, or non-Gaeltacht, islands had any subsidised service. The second thing I did later on was to introduce an islander rate. In other words, if the Minister of State or I takes the boat, we pay the ordinary commercial rate. However, on the subsidised services, there is an islander rate that is much lower. It was €8 for an adult but I think it is €10 now. However, it is still much lower than the commercial rate that a tourist or visitor would pay.

The Minister keeps telling me that she cannot do this because there are subsidised and non-subsidised services going to the islands. This is a mantra that is probably in the Minister of State’s script tonight as well. Two things arise from that. The non-subsidised services are not bound by this €10 fare. They do not have to give islanders a reduced rate and they do not. They have never complained that the subsidised services are subsidised to give this rate. The second thing is whether the Minister of State can tell me where all these islands are the Minister keeps telling me about, which I have not heard of, that have subsidised and non-subsidised services running in parallel. I do not want to hear that there is a service from Doolin to the Aran Islands in the summer and that the service from Ros an Mhíl is competing with it. The subsidised islander rate is only available in Ros an Mhíl.

This issue has dragged on. It is amazing that on the mainland you have subsidised and non-subsidised services. As the Minister of State knows, Expressway is not subsidised and is not subject to the reduction in fares and neither are many other private bus operators. This idea that there is some massive difference between the islands and the mainland is wrong. In fact, it is the other way around. The mainland has a mixture of services all over the place - some are subsidised and some are not, and all of them licensed by the National Transport Authority, NTA, as I understand.

In a reply to a parliamentary question last week, the Minister said that at last she had received the Attorney General’s advice that had been sought in March of this year. Remember, this scheme is only going to run from April to December. How this was such a massive legal issue that it took from March to the end of June to get an answer, I will never understand. If the Minister of State can tell me the matter has been considered and the Minister will drop the fare by 20%, we need not go any further and one sentence will do as a reply. We are all here late at night and it is unnecessary. I am told this is being considered by the officials. When will the Minister, not the officials, make a decision on this?

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