Seanad debates

Tuesday, 24 May 2005

2:30 pm

Photo of Martin ManserghMartin Mansergh (Fianna Fail)

I join in expressing deep sympathy following the awful tragedy yesterday. When considering the issues that may arise when the full reports are completed, the Government should be guided by the same principle that guided the Leader with regard to railways when she was Minister for Public Enterprise. We cannot scrimp on safety.

I would like to see the Government decision on the introduction of post codes debated in the House. It is important that this be done in a manner friendly to the ordinary household and individual. Ordinary citizens can remember their own addresses, those of their nearest and dearest and of their close friends, but once one must use a code such as "ALW5XZ", for example, then every time one addresses a letter one must look up the numbers.

We succeeded in terms of having a user-friendly arrangement for car registration, including the year of registration, the country name and so on. That undoubtedly was an aid to memory. I hope that those devising the postal codes will not just give us a jungle of numbers but something which will be a serious aid to memory. Otherwise, the benefit will go only to businesses trying to push material at people, and the private household will suffer the cost.

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