Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I welcome that information, particularly that the Minister will be meeting with SIPTU on this issue. I was lucky enough to go to the bus depot in Summerhill to look at the electric buses recently, which are fantastic to see. One of the issues we discussed was the need to attract more women into the service. One of the big barriers to that is the need to communicate to the public or those who might be seeking employment in the service that it is a safe job for women, and indeed that it is safe for women in general to use public transport with their children. The perception that public transport might not always be safe is a barrier in terms of gender and diversity and in terms of those with different abilities. It might, in fact, be a barrier to organisations like Bus Éireann attracting female drivers and a barrier to their project of getting more mná into the service.

See this speech in context