Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I raise the issue of the lack of rural taxis. Every weekend, especially during the summer months, throughout west Cork, in towns such as Bandon, Clonakilty, Skibbereen, Bantry, Kinsale, etc., young people are out, have had a great night, have been to the restaurant, to the pub, and have been socialising. When it comes to home time, however, they are in limbo. They are stuck and they have nowhere to go because there is a complete lack of taxi services. This has been an ongoing issue for quite a while. If we do not rectify it, it will affect not just young people's ability to socialise and have a good time but also the pub trade, restaurants, etc., so we need to step in now and intervene. The Taoiseach's former party colleague and the former Minister of State, Jim Daly, who is from my constituency, had the excellent idea of ruxi, as he called it, a rural tax service whereby private individuals like Uber would be able to offer taxi services. Can we revisit that and finally sort out the issue of the lack of taxis in rural Ireland?

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