Paschal Donohoe (Fine Gael)

——is something with which I strongly disagree. Competition can play an appropriate role at times in ensuring that the needs of our entire community and society can be met. I have great respect for Senator Norris and the points that he has made about this Bill and the Seanad. If we do not make these points now about this authority and this Bill, then the train will leave the station. This organisation will have extraordinary power to deal with many of the issues we are facing here. The ability to deliver competition can and should play a role in meeting the needs of Dublin's commuters.

In saying all that, I agree entirely with the point made by the Minister a moment ago. I do not want such competition to be at the expense of people who are working in some of the organisations that might come in here in the future. I do not want to see people being paid a fraction of the wages they need to look after their families and so on. However, the Booz Allen Hamilton report on subvention payments to Dublin Bus, commissioned by the Minister, pointed out that the company and others got more than €230 million of taxpayers' money. In fairness, that report also stated that in many cases Dublin Bus is making great use of that money. From personal experience dealing with Dublin Bus in my constituency, I have found it to be a very professional and progressive organisation. None the less, the point still stands. New services will be required that cannot be provided by Dublin Bus, so we should look elsewhere for them to be provided. In the new financial environment we are facing, it is vital that we have a spur of competition to ensure taxpayers' money is well spent.

I am not advocating the kind of complete deregulation that is occasionally used to rubbish these arguments. We can see that is not working. We should set in place a framework to ensure the private sector is allowed to provide services to ensure that commuters can benefit and to ensure money is well spent. That is not tin pot competition nor does it represent an ideological approach to this issue. It is an attempt to come up with a model that will ensure our money is well spent in providing transport services and that the needs of commuters are better met than they are at the moment.