Barry Ward (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)

In the Minister of State's response, he said the "Sutton to Sandycove cycleway, also commonly referred to as the east cost trail". It is not. They are different things. This is the frustrating thing I am dealing with in regard to management at local level, this notion that they are the same thing. They are not. The east coast trail, as the Minister of State has just described, comes inside the DART lane at Merrion Gates. When cyclist come over the Merrion Gates and onto Merrion Road, they are battling with buses, cars and all the other traffic. The S2S is a coastal cycleway and promenade outside the DART line. There are none of the dangers associated with wrestling with traffic, and we do not have to do that.

All of the things the Minister of State has set out there with regard to trying to avoid private car use and all the rest is great. I agree with all of that. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council has done great work in putting in place what it calls the coastal mobility route, which runs inside the DART line. It is a fantastic facility. It faced a lot of opposition at the time but it is great. However, it is not the S2S. Somehow, there is this decision at local level, which has no democratic legitimacy whatsoever because it is totally contrary to what democratically elected people actually asked for and want, that the S2S is inside the DART line.

I want to know where elected people made this decision. They did not make this decision. When I went up to the ECRIPP consultation, I met with officials and engineers from Iarnród Éireann and it was said that the S2S was essentially written out of the plans. It formed part of our development plans, and over successive plans, officials in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown and elsewhere have eroded its legitimacy and taken it out through inaction, objection and obfuscation, and they have never said why. They have never given a good reason it cannot go ahead, apart from some problems, every one of which could be overcome.

When Covid hit, one single acting director of services in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council built the whole of that coastal mobility route without consultation with anyone. If we want to talk about democratic deficits, that is one. If one official can make that decision after decades of locally elected representatives trying to do the same thing, where is the state of our local democracy? The S2S is outside the DART line but it has been written out by officialdom. It is irresponsible and unfair to people who elected councillors to Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council over successive elections and who were in favour of this that it has simply been disregarded.

It is not the Minister of State's fault. I recognise that but I am frustrated about it.

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