Results 2,861-2,880 of 11,242 for speaker:Noel Dempsey

Departmental Agencies. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: With regard to the other matter to which the Deputy referred, he will be aware that quite a hullabaloo was kicked up in respect of advertising, PR, etc., in the middle of last year. The Department of Finance decided that the funding in this regard should be cut. Every Department and agency was obliged to make cuts and the RSA, the work of which is specifically focused on advertising, was no...

Departmental Agencies. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: I agree with the Deputy that one death on our roads is one death too many. His figure of approximately 3,000 deaths on the roads since the turn of the millennium is reasonably accurate. However, if we had not taken the actions that we did take, the death toll would, on the basis of the figures for 1999 and 2000, have been 4,000. I agree with the Deputy that it is hugely important to...

Official Engagements. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: I had a most constructive meeting with the UK Under Secretary of State for Transport on 21 May 2009. We discussed the delivery and development of the aids to navigation services in the UK and Ireland. We both appreciate the valuable work carried out by the service in both countries but stressed that we were anxious that optimum, cost-effective use should be made of the resources available...

Official Engagements. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: The intention is that we will fund the extra service, not that we will cut back on any services.

Official Engagements. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: Off the top of my head, the change made will amount to an extra €2.5 million of Exchequer funding. I will check that for Deputy O'Dowd.

Airport Development Projects. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: The Dublin Airport Authority, DAA, operates under a clear commercial mandate and its capital investment programme is entirely funded from its own internal resources with no Exchequer funding involved. Accordingly, decisions on the delay or cancellation of aviation projects fall within the responsibility of the management and board of the DAA. Following the announcement of its annual results...

Airport Development Projects. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: Any proposed cut in jobs, whether in a semi-State body or in the private sector, is of concern. I do not interfere directly in the day to day operation of the DAA. All aspects of the aviation industry are suffering greatly. There are some small signs of recovery but in the current economic circumstances the company has a duty and a responsibility to live within its means and that is what...

Airport Development Projects. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: The DAA and I are conscious of what Deputy O'Dowd said. The DAA will advance planning for all projects and bring them as close to shovel-ready as possible before making a decision on whether the projects can go ahead and take advantage of any upturn.

Rural Transport Services. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: In the past ten years the capacity and quality of bus and rail services provided by Iarnród Éireann and Bus Éireann have increased in line with high levels of capital and current funding. The majority of track and signalling infrastructure on the regional rail network has been upgraded, and the rolling stock fleet has been completely renewed. Station facilities and accessibility have...

Rural Transport Services. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: I do not know what cutbacks the Deputy is talking about. The subvention given to Bus Éireann and CIE companies generally increased this year. In the supplementary budget on 7 April, we had to take €10 million of the increased subvention from the company but we did not do that until we received an assurance from the company that it would be able to find that extra money through sales of...

Rural Transport Services. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: The Deputy is wrong, we have not cut back the subsidy to Bus Éireann, I have told him that.

Rural Transport Services. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: I explained what is happening to the Deputy a few minutes ago and I am not going to waste Dáil time repeating it. The overall subsidy available to Bus Éireann is as it was. The difficulty faced by CIE is being faced across the country in a range of sectors - a reduction in the number of passengers using the buses leading to a fall in revenue. We have asked Bus Éireann to live within its...

Road Traffic Offences. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: Under the Road Safety Authority Act 2006 (Conferral of Functions) Order 2006 (SI No. 477 of 2006) the operation of the penalty points were applied. At the end of March 2009 there were 192,686 penalty points events recorded in respect of drivers who did not present an Irish driving licence. Of this total, a foreign licence was presented in 142,588 instances. The NVDF only contains records of...

Road Traffic Offences. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: The Deputy is silent when the number of fatalities decreases.

Road Traffic Offences. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: Let us keep it as an all-party issue then and not make political statements about it. As the Deputy knows, we have all had this experience at various times. There will be a decline in fatalities for a number of months then there will be a sudden increase in incidents. The Deputy is right, the three months just past were worse than the same three months last year. Overall, fatalities are...

Road Traffic Offences. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: As I explained to the Deputy, of the 192,000 cases for which penalty points could not be recorded, 142,588 were foreign drivers.

Public Transport. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: Significant investment in public transport has been undertaken in recent years which has facilitated major improvements in the safety of our transport systems and increased capacity on bus and rail networks. Work on three new Luas lines is currently under way as is work on the new commuter line in Cork, the first phase of the western rail corridor and the first phase of the Navan rail line...

Public Transport. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: As I said to the Deputy, no such decisions have been taken. Transport 21 remains the framework for what we want to achieve. I have made it clear here and outside this House that I intend to bring every project I can right through to the stage where they go to tender and money is required. At that stage the final decisions will be made on what projects go ahead based on an economic...

Public Transport. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: As I said to the Deputy on a number of occasions and just a few minutes ago, all the public transport projects in Transport 21 are being advanced this year.

Public Transport. (26 May 2009)

Noel Dempsey: As I have tried to explain to the Deputy on a number of occasions, not all the roads or public transport budgets could be spent because of the number of projects still in planning. The crunch years for public transport projects and the decisions on whether they will go ahead will be next year and the year after.