Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

The sections to which the Senator referred deal with the provision of public transport as it operates at present. The licensing regime for PSO regulated services does not apply to the commercial service, to which the Senator adverted, for example, in the case of an operator wishing to compete on a commercial basis. Those sections deal with the contracts that must be in place to provide largely subvented services in those areas. Therefore, it would not be practical simply to suspend that provision for whatever period would be required.

I believe the Senator is making the point that we should have competition on various routes. There will be open competition on routes other than the existing subvented routes, namely, the PSO routes, once this Bill is enacted.