Derek McDowell (Labour)

We need to limit the number of passengers. We cannot continue to allow the large numbers of people who arrive at Heuston Station on Friday to board the trains. We cannot do that because sooner or later there will be a tragic accident and questions will be asked.

Others have mentioned Transport 21 and I feel like a broken record complaining about this but it is genuinely disappointing. I have complained about integrated ticketing in the past. The website of the Department of Transport is fantastic because it allows one to look at press releases dating back to 1997. I entered Midleton into the search engine this morning to ascertain how often the extension from Cork to Midleton had been announced. It was first announced in 1998 and again in 1999 by the then Minister, Senator O'Rourke. It was included in the national development plan in 2000. The extension was announced again in 2004 as a definitive plan with an amount of money provided and now it has appeared again in the Transport 21 plan launched two days ago. I hope it happens but the Minister of State must understand that people are deeply sceptical about this. One could take half a dozen different transport proposals, trace them back with the benefit of the Department's website, and see that they have been announced so many times that the credibility of the Minister and his Department is now zilch.

I read, very carefully, the contribution of the Minister for Finance, Deputy Cowen, to the presentation of the Transport 21 plan. There were ifs and buts in what he said. When the Minister for Finance says that the money is being provided but is predicated on the presumption of 4.5% growth, which is as much as most people believe we can manage, and that he still only intends to spend approximately €5 billion per annum on the public capital programme, which is what we are already spending, then alarm bells should, justifiably, start to ring. Essentially what he is saying is that he thinks the plan is a good idea and will remain so in ten years time, but we may not be able to afford it and other priorities may arise. Furthermore, even though the current Minister for Finance thinks it is a good idea, his successor may not agree.

The metro was first announced in 2000, by the then Minister, Senator O'Rourke, and almost everybody thinks the metro is a good idea, except Mr. Michael O'Leary. Why has it not happened? It has not happened, not because the Department of Transport wanted to stop it, although there are some officials who are not enthusiastic, but because the officials in Merrion Street will not sign the cheques. It also has not happened because in recent years whenever we think we cannot afford a project or are not enthusiastic about providing money from Exchequer funds, we have taken to saying we will do it by way of a public-private partnership, PPP.

In the past I have been reasonably enthusiastic about PPPs but they are not a panacea. There are many projects in which the private sector is not interested or which would necessitate paying it far too much to stimulate its interest. We must, in the first instance, provide Exchequer funding and if there is private sector interest also, then that is fine. However, we cannot predicate a major project on there being private sector interest because we cannot guarantee that. Frankly, if the interest is not organically present, then frequently we end up having to pay far too much for private sector involvement in projects. When I see that €8 billion of the plan's budget is predicated on private sector interest, then I get worried. I worry whether we can afford, or will choose to afford, to complete all elements of the plan, assuming the current Government is in power for a significant part of the next ten years.

I would like to ask the Minister of State a few questions about Luas. I assume the requirement for safety procedures and so on under the Bill will apply to Luas. Since the Bill has been on the stocks since the Luas came into operation, have the various provisions that already apply to the Luas system a benchmark of safety procedures under which they operate? Is it the operator, which is a French company, or the rail authority that is responsible for ensuring that the safety procedures are in operation? It appears that we are saying that if the service is not safe it can slow down. I am not sure this is a sufficient basis on which to proceed.

Part 9 has invited a fair bit of interest, not least from our colleagues in the trade union movement, with whom I disagree on this issue. The Bill provides that the same levels of intoxicants must be present in the blood of a crucial safety worker in order for an offence to be committed. I am strongly of the view that we should take a zero tolerance approach to this issue and that individuals who are responsible for trains, which may carry hundreds of people, should not be permitted any safe level of alcohol. I know it is being done on the basis that workers and drivers in other positions are allowed to have one or one and a half drinks, therefore, in the interests of fairness and equality, it should apply to rail workers. I do not believe this should be the case. I do not think we should even contemplate the possibility that someone who is responsible for the safety of hundreds of people should have any level of alcohol in his or her blood. My inclination is that there should be zero tolerance in that regard. I agree with what my colleagues in the trade union movement said about the need for an independent person to take and process the sample. As Senator Wilson said, there may be a constitutional issue, which the Minister of State must clarify.

I welcome the Bill. I would like to think that much of what it provides for is already in operation. However, it is well to get it onto the Statute Book.