Noel Ahern (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)

This amendment, as proposed, would undermine one of the central tenets of the Bill which is the establishment of a strong, independent, strategic body that will have responsibility for all surface transport in the greater Dublin area. The inclusion of members of existing public transport authorities in the membership of the authority is not being considered. Furthermore, as the authority will also assume responsibility for securing the provision of public transport passenger services by means of contractual arrangements as outlined in Part 3, it would be inappropriate to have members of the public transport service providers acting also as members of the contracting authority. In the circumstances I ask the Senators to withdraw the amendment.