Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising this important topic. I will take this matter on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan. I understand that the Deputy's matter relates to the provision of bus services on routes operated by Go-Ahead Ireland, and whether any measures can or have been taken to improve these services.

My Department has responsibility for policy and overall funding in respect of public transport. However, the Department is not involved in the day-to-day operation of public transport services nationally, including those public service obligation, PSO, routes currently operated by Go-Ahead Ireland. The NTA has statutory responsibility for securing the provision of public passenger transport services nationally by way of public transport services contracts, and for the allocation of associated funding to the relevant transport operators.

PSO services are socially necessary but financially unviable services and the PSO programme represents a significant expenditure of taxpayers' money. Funding support has increased in recent years. Currently, the vast majority of PSO bus services are provided by either Dublin Bus or Bus Éireann through what are known as direct award contracts. The remaining routes are operated by Go-Ahead Ireland, which entered the market in September 2018 as part of Government's commitment to open up the bus market through a programme of tendering known as "bus market opening". A key Government objective is to provide all citizens with reliable and realistic sustainable mobility options. Public transport plays a key role in the delivery of this goal.

To support this objective, in budget 2022, the Department secured €538 million of funding for PSO and Local Link services provided by State operators and under contract by the NTA this year. This includes more than €200 million of Covid-19 emergency funding in 2022 to counter the continuing impacts of the pandemic on fare revenue across transport operators.

In the context of the Deputy's specific question regarding the PSO services currently operated by Go-Ahead Ireland, as the Deputy will be aware and as he alluded to, the Covid-19 health emergency has had a profound impact on the public transport sector due to the fall in passenger numbers, and the associated drop in fare revenues. To date, passenger numbers remain below pre-Covid levels and demand is currently at 80% of that experienced in 2019. This is expected to improve further in the coming months..

It is important to note that the pandemic has also had a significant impact on the staff of the various public transport operators that continued to operate throughout the crisis, with absences fluctuating throughout the pandemic as each new wave of the virus spread across the population.Unfortunately, Go-Ahead Ireland, in addition to a number of other public transport providers, is experiencing higher than normal levels of Covid-related staff absences at present. As a result of these higher levels of staff absenteeism across the transport network, there has been a knock-on effect on service delivery, resulting in some services not operating as scheduled. The NTA has advised that all public transport operators experiencing this issue are endeavouring to ensure that the first and last scheduled services operate as planned, and that consecutive bus services are not curtailed or cancelled, whenever possible.

The NTA has further advised that all public transport operators have for some months been working hard to recruit additional staff and, as a result, staff levels are beginning to improve gradually. I will continue to engage with the authority to ensure that all operators in the bus market provide a satisfactory level of service to meet the demands of customers in line with their contracts. I will also raise this directly with the Minister.

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