James Bannon (Fine Gael)

I second the Fine Gael amendment and welcome the Minister for Transport to the House once more.

Nobody disputes the fact that the penalty points system has saved lives. A grey area remains, however, as many lives will be lost if adequate resources are not provided by the Government. The penalty points system can be effective in its present form and extensions have been proposed. The Minister has failed to provide the resources and funding needed for the enforcement of the system. The reduction in Garda manpower since the beginning of the year has had an adverse affect on the Garda's ability to operate the system effectively and is eroding the life-saving potential of the scheme.

The Government must accept blame for its inefficient planning, especially in the area of road infrastructure. We have been told time and again that the national primary and secondary routes, the bypasses needed in the main towns and the bottlenecks will be taken care of under the national development plan within 20 years. There is no evidence that this will happen following recent Government cutbacks. The Government has failed miserably to address the situation in relation to carriageways and motorways. We have allowed the great years of the Celtic tiger to bypass us with regard to funding. The Government has allowed an opportunity to put a proper road structure in place to pass. There has also been a failure to provide sufficient resources for the effective operation of the penalty points system. The Garda should be given the manpower and resources to operate the system effectively.

An initiative aimed at improving driving standards should be introduced and the failure rate in the driving test tackled. Many have spoken about the driving test system. The Minister spoke about doing something about this, but there has been very little action. What plans has the Minister to reform the driver training system? The driving test failure rate currently stands at 52% to 53% nationally, whereas other EU countries have a much higher pass rate.