Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)

I welcome the eight proposals in the motion put forward by Deputy O'Gorman. They are very welcome and timely. The very important ones are to further reduce fares and to further accelerate the Connecting Ireland rural bus programme. The all-island rail strategy was mentioned. It is important, as we move towards the reunification of the national territory, that this is stepped up as a practical measure to connect North and South, particularly Donegal, Derry, Sligo, Fermanagh and the other counties of the north west.

We have a lot of catching up to do given that the transport sector accounts for 43% of all energy used. The Climate Change Advisory Council set out again today that we must reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% by 2030. We should be even more ambitious than that. There is huge ground to be made up there.

On the school transport sector, the Climate Change Advisory Council report, published today, notes that of 773,000 primary and post-primary pupils, only 172,000, or 18%, have access to school transport. We can see the difference when schools are on holidays. In mornings and afternoons, the volume of traffic on the roads of all towns, villages and cities, such as Dublin, reduces dramatically. We must change that. One in five car journeys is for the purpose of getting children to school. We can see what needs to be done. We need to drastically improve and expand the school transport system but we cannot do so because we do not have the drivers. Bus operators throughout the country can tell the Minister of State that. We need to deal with the Bus Éireann ban on drivers over 70 years of age for its services and contracted services. The Taoiseach and Tánaiste agreed with me on the issue on the floor of the Dáil. The Minister for Transport, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, agreed me with, as far as I know. I think the Minister of State also agrees that we need to sort that out. We have eight weeks to do so. I have been raising this matter since the first day of Dáil sittings after the new Government was formed. It needs to be sorted out. The review is complete. How many times does it have to be shuffled around between civil servants, their advisers and everybody else? We need to sort it. Drivers should be allowed to work and drive school buses until they are 75 provided they pass a strict medical and eyesight test every year. They are driving private coaches with 52, 72 and 78 passengers. Why can they not drive a minibus of kids to the local school in Shanahoe, Abbeyleix, Ballyroan or any other village or town around the country? We need to sort that and dramatically increase the number of drivers available.

We need to keep cash payments. While I support the move to cashless and contactless payments, we should also retain the option of cash. That is important. Some of us prefer to use cash when at all possible. That is particularly the case for people who do not have bank cards or use phones for payments.

The passenger experience has been mentioned already. There is no doubt that the public transport system has improved and I acknowledge it. Train services have improved. There is now a large number of trains in Portlaoise. There are trains on the hour and sometimes two per hour, which is a dramatic improvement. However, there is only one toilet in the station and sometimes it is not operational. There is one small weather shelter on the outbound platform. There could sometimes be 200 or 300 people standing there. If it rains, 90% of those on the platform are standing in the rain. That needs to change. There are simple things like that to address. We need simple shelters for people to stand under when they are waiting for a train.

I welcome the local bus service in Portlaoise, which has been rolled out in recent months. It has proved a great success. It is fantastic. Some days I can come to Leinster House by walking 100 yd from my front door, getting on a bus to the railway station, getting the train to Dublin, walking out of the station and onto another bus, which drops me down the road. I acknowledge that the bus service in Portlaoise has been fantastic, but we need more rolled out. I ask the Minister of State to sort out the over-70s nonsense. He needs to sort it in the coming weeks and we are depending on him.

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