Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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In the past two weeks, I have been inundated with complaints about Go-Ahead Ireland buses not showing up. I have spoken to my colleague, Councillor Conor Reddy in Ballymun-Finglas. I have also spoken to Deputy Boyd Barrett, who represents Dún Laoghaire. It is clear to me that this is not just an issue in Tallaght or Dublin South-West. It is the same story everywhere that Go-Ahead Ireland has a contract to operate bus services. The S6, S8, N6 and N2 all provide the same terrible service. I am not talking about a ghost bus here or there. In some cases, half the buses have been cancelled, leaving people late for work, school and college. Cancellations and ghost buses have been an ongoing issue with these privatised routes but in the past few weeks, it has become absolutely ridiculous.

I will give the House some examples from people who have contacted me. One person said that their 14-year-old son gets the S6 bus service from Rathfarnham to his secondary school in Booterstown every day. My correspondent went on to state that the service has been appalling ever since the family started using it in 2023. Services are often cancelled and sometimes consecutive buses are cancelled and the following buses are therefore full. As one can imagine, this leads to extremely long waiting times and lateness for school. My correspondent went on to state that in the past few months, the service has deteriorated even further and has become utterly unreliable. My correspondent tells me they have contacted Go-Ahead several times but have received no response at all.

A UCD student contacted me to say he was late for lectures three days in a row because of cancellations, delays and overloaded S6s that did not stop. He said that many young people like him are considering buying cars because public transport is so unreliable.

Another parent contacted me to say that she had to pay for her daughter to get taxis to her college exams because they did not trust the buses to get her there on time, if at all. Once her daughter gets her driving licence, she says, she does not see why she would ever use a bus again.

The S6 from Tallaght to Blackrock and back is the route most often reported to the no-show bus tracker of the Dublin Inquirer. The statistics of the National Transport Authority, NTA, show that one in three S6s fails to arrive within seven minutes of the advertised departure time. It is no coincidence. All of these testimonies and complaints are about privatised services that are operated by Go-Ahead Ireland, which is more concerned with making profits than providing a decent and reliable bus service. The latest excuse is that it does not have enough mechanics and that is why buses are out of service. Why does it not have enough mechanics? It is because Go-Ahead Ireland has worse terms and conditions than Dublin Bus. It understandably cannot attract mechanics. Why does it have worse terms and conditions? It is in order to maximise profits at the expense of workers and passengers.

The Government's response has been to repeatedly fine Go-Ahead Ireland for its terrible service. In 2023, it was fined €3 million. Go-Ahead Ireland stated that the problem was staff shortages and promised to rapidly recruit more staff. Here we are again nearly two years later. What is the Government's response? It is to give Go-Ahead Ireland more routes. Last month, the NTA gave Go-Ahead Ireland a new €50 million contract to operate an outer Dublin metropolitan area bus service from next October. Go-Ahead Ireland might leave its customers waiting but we can be sure that its shareholders will not be left waiting for dividends.

Will the Government instruct the NTA to give Go-Ahead Ireland's routes back to Dublin Bus? Instead of pursuing privatisation, will the Government commit to investing the billions of euros from the Government surplus and the Apple tax money into improving and expanding bus services? Will it invest in desperately needed new public transport infrastructure, such as metro north, metro south west and additional Luas lines?

Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this important topic, which I am taking on behalf of the Minister, Deputy O'Brien.

From the outset, I would like to clarify that the Minister for Transport has responsibility for policy and overall funding in respect of public transport but neither the Minister nor his officials is involved in the day-to-day operation of public transport services. The statutory responsibility for securing the provision of public passenger transport services nationally rests with the NTA. The NTA works in conjunction with the public transport operators that deliver the services and have responsibility for day-to-day operational matters, in this case Go-Ahead Ireland.

That said, I reassure the Deputy that the Department is strongly committed to providing all citizens with reliable and realistic sustainable mobility options, and public transport plays a key role in the delivery of this goal. To support this objective, in budget 2025 the Department of Transport secured €658 million of funding for public service obligation, PSO, and Transport for Ireland, TFI, Local Link services, which was an increase from €618 million in 2024. That includes funding for the continuation of the 20% fare reduction on PSO services, the young adult card on both PSO and commercial bus services and the 90-minute fare until the end of 2025. Funding has also been secured to extend free child fares on PSO services to include those aged between five and eight years and to support the roll-out of new and enhanced bus and rail services under programmes such as BusConnects and Connecting Ireland.

As the Deputy will be aware, the Government recently commitment to improving public transport under the new programme for Government, Securing Ireland's Future, and is backing up that commitment with significant investments across the bus and rail network.

I understand that the Department of Transport is engaging with the NTA regarding the issues concerning particular bus services operated by Go-Ahead Ireland across some of the greater Dublin area routes. The Department has been advised that Go-Ahead Ireland is currently experiencing fleet reliability issues across its network of services due to a shortfall of the availability of mechanics to carry out essential maintenance works. This is unfortunately having a knock-on effect on the delivery of services, resulting in reduced availability of vehicles and a disruption to service levels.

These fleet reliability issues are primarily affecting routes S4, from Liffey Valley to UCD, and S6, The Square Tallaght to Blackrock, as well as some of the routes in the Bray and Greystones area, which were launched on 26 January as part of the roll-out of the latest phase of BusConnects Dublin.

I acknowledge the concerns that the Deputy has raised about these services and fully appreciate how frustrating it is for users. The Minister for Transport understands the importance of maintaining connectivity for all users and I assure the Deputy that I have been advised that the NTA is closely monitoring the situation with regard to service delivery on these routes and is receiving daily reports from Go-Ahead Ireland on service availability by route and progress with resolving these issues. I have been advised that the operator has indicated to the NTA that there have been significant improvements in dealing with these issues, and that the services will continue to improve over the coming days. I have been further advised that the NTA has requested that a remedial plan be supplied from Go-Ahead Ireland, outlining details of when services are expected to return to a full timetable on each of the affected routes.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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I thank the Minister of State for the answer. I obviously accept that the Minister for Transport is not involved in the day-to-day operation of public transport services. I am not holding the Minister personally responsible for any bus not turning up, but at the same time, the Minister of State referred to the Government's recent commitment to improving public transport under the new programme for Government. The underlying issue here is a policy choice of pursuing privatisation of public transport routes, in this case, routes formerly done by Dublin Bus. That is why we have a crisis with the S4, S6 and so on. I recommend that people report no-show buses on noshowbus.ie, on which one will see that between 16 October and 3 December, public transport users reported 48 ghost buses on the S6 route alone.

Like the Minister of State said in his response, the issue being reported is "fleet reliability issues across its network of services due to a shortfall of the availability of mechanics". Why is it having that problem when Dublin Bus is not? The answer is very simple. Go-Ahead Ireland cannot recruit mechanics because Dublin Bus offers better terms and conditions, so if you are a mechanic, you make the entirely rational and reasonable choice to go and work for Dublin Bus and not, therefore, for Go-Ahead Ireland. Who pays the price for that? The workers, who end up with worse terms and conditions in Go-Ahead Ireland, and the commuters who are trying to use public transport. The Taoiseach earlier referred to the Opposition as being fundamentalist in its ideology. It is the most fundamentalist neoliberal ideology to think that we need to do this somehow. It clearly does not work and a different policy decision should be made to get rid of privatisation and to bring the routes back in-house, to Dublin Bus.

Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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I assure the Deputy that I fully recognise that transport connectivity is hugely important for people who live, work and study in Ireland and it is key to revitalising our villages, towns and urban centres. We need to expand the public transport network and increase service levels as outlined in policies like Connecting Ireland and BusConnects. We aim to achieve more balanced regional development and greater connectivity for all public transport. BusConnects has already achieved significant success in transforming Dublin’s public transport network. In the latest progress report, published in July 2024, comparisons were made between network redesign phases 1 to 5a before launch, from quarter 4 of 2019, and after launch, from quarter 4 of 2023. The programme has led to a substantial increase in service levels, and customer satisfaction research carried out earlier this year shows that phases 1 to 4 of the network redesign project are positively rated by users. The research shows that 80% of users are satisfied with the service and 49% reported that the service is now better.

It is important from my point of view that anybody who uses public transport has a good experience so that they will continue to use it. When issues arise, they have to be treated seriously. That is why I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. The NTA and the Department of Transport will continue collaborating with operators and customers to enhance the punctuality and reliability of services throughout the network redesign. As I mentioned earlier, I have been advised that the NTA is working closely with Go-Ahead Ireland to identify steps that can be taken to improve service delivery on the impacted routes, and that some improvements have already taken place. Further, through initiatives like the capacity improvement programme and the implementation of ticketing technologies, we are taking steps to enhance capacity and improve the overall travel experience for passengers. On behalf of the Minister, Deputy O’Brien, I thank Deputy Murphy for raising this important issue.