Brian Hayes (Fine Gael)

The key problem is peak traffic time for those vehicles going through areas. As Senator Morrissey has said, there are other problems, associated with people parking those vehicles over a weekend or for a day or so. We need to send out a very strong message in the legislation that this is not permissible. Businesses, wherever they operate, have a responsibility to abide by the law. The way to get the message through to businesses which continually flout the law in this area is to indicate that it will come down heavily on them. If their drivers are caught in residential areas they will be fined, receive penalty points and the law will come down hard on them. That is the only way they will take any notice and that is the message the Bill needs to send out. I ask the Minister to examine the matter again rather than giving the House a definitive view on it now.

It is interesting that there was some disagreement in what I had heard from the Department and from our own people on this issue. It has now been clarified that penalty points exist, but I believe they are not enough. We need to come down heavily in this regard. We are not coming down heavily on drivers because they are working for a business. However, they cause enormous encroachment in large-scale residential areas, particularly around peak-time. They know the rat-runs and the short-cuts and they use them to best effect. They go over speed bumps and will use whatever roadways are available even though, as Senator Morrissey said, the roads may be beside play areas. It is not acceptable in this day and age that large articulated lorries can be allowed to go through residential areas. I ask the Minister of State to give the matter further consideration.