Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with colleagues. If it was only Donegal that did not have rail, we might be in a far better starting position. Unfortunately, there are many other counties in the same boat as Donegal. Many people will be familiar with the map that compares the rail network today with the rail network 100 years ago. It is an incredible shame that we are where we are now and have lost that fantastic infrastructure that would serve us so well.

The OECD will release a report today or in the coming days that will reflect on Ireland’s approach to transport and the Government’s approach to transport policy. It will be critical of the Government's decision to place so many eggs in the basket of electric vehicles. It is well known at this stage that the target of 1 million EVs is a fantasy target and meaningless. If Government had sense, it would just walk away from that, for many reasons.

The many reasons for expanding the public transport network have already been articulated in terms of climate, social benefits, inclusivity, health and economics. A public transport network is like a good education system; it is a great social equaliser.

Sinn Féin produced a set of proposals. I welcome the opportunity to speak on this and I thank Deputy Pringle for tabling the motion. We need the Government to be aggressive and ambitious in the roll-out of public transport. It needs to involve more than reports and targets. Communities need to see delivery to ensure they have a public transport system that is accessible, affordable, available, meets their needs and works for them. That is the standard. It needs to make sense for people. If the public transport option does not make sense for people, they will not use it. In many cases, they will not use it because they cannot use it; it is not affordable, accessible and available to them.

Sinn Féin set out a suite of proposals. I understand from the budget discussions that the Government is considering many options. We want to set out what we want the Government to do and what we would do if we were in government. We would make the 20% public transport fare reductions permanent, not just extend them to the end of next year. We would make them permanent and expand them to private bus operators. Whether it is Suirway in the south east, Buggy Coaches in Kilkenny or, in my area, Ashbourne Connect, these are services that are either dropping or reducing their services because they cannot compete. We would cut public transport fares by 50% for those under 18 to encourage positive habit formation. We would make public transport more accessible for people with disabilities by investing €12.6 million in the public transport accessibility retrofit programme. We would do that every year for a term in government bringing the total in that fund to €137 million. That would, in a five-year term, make all public transport fully accessible.

The Minister of State has heard the stories of people having to wait 24 hours or having to send a notification and about lifts not working and public transport services not being accessible. That needs to be addressed. We would accelerate the roll-out of rural bus services. There is a good plan in Connecting Ireland and there is a real demand for it. However, the funding is not there. It is a five-year €56 million programme, with €5 million invested in the first year, and we do not know what will come in subsequent years. Sinn Féin would put €25 million into that programme this year. The Government should do the same. In 2023, we need communities to see new services they can access at an affordable rate.

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