Kevin Humphreys (Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Minister, Deputy Ross, is welcome back to the Seanad. I hope he will visit much more often in future.

I will continue on the subject of aviation emissions by posing a question on investment and expansion in the aviation area. We discussed improved connectivity, involving the connection of Dublin to an increasing number of American, European and Asian cities. Is achieving this on the basis of a hub really servicing the Irish market or is Dublin servicing Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh and London as an alternative hub airport? Have we done a cost–benefit analysis in regard to emissions and their cost if they are to be attributed to Ireland? I do not believe any real thought has been put into that. We heard the announcement last week on connecting Dublin to Seattle. Where is the demand in this regard? Is this to service Dublin and the Irish economy or is it to service the European economy? Has a cost–benefit analysis being done in respect of charges and fines?

With regard to Dublin Bus, the Minister mentioned that additional buses with EU6 engines have been purchased. These are obviously engines with much lower emissions. The more polluting engines are to be phased out. Paris and London, however, are way ahead of us with electric buses. Paris is substantially on its way to having an electric bus fleet. We have not even started to trial electric buses. In fact, Dublin Bus failed to get funding for those trials. We are so far behind. I acknowledge the Minister is pulled in every direction. Next week, he could be asked in here to allow for a bypass around a town, and he might be asked what motorway needs to be built to connect to a given city. Climate change, however, has to be the number one priority for the Department because there are growing emissions in the transport sector.

The Minister has talked about sustained investment in public transport and improving quality and capacity.There has been very little improvement in quality and capacity on our rail routes. In fact, the travel times to Cork and Portlaoise, with the reduction in speed on the main lines, have been increasing which is only encouraging more people to use their cars. If the Minister is serious about that, he will need to roll out the necessary funding.

The next aspiration referred to by the Minister is to secure an early transition to low emission vehicles. Where is the Minister's plan for charging points for electric vehicles? If there are not enough charging points, people will not purchase electric cars in large numbers. If the Minister wants to go for a walk some afternoon, he should go down to Mount Street where there are two electric vehicle charging points beside the Pepper Canister. One will often see cars double parked there, waiting to be recharged. Any motorist with a petrol engine vehicle who drives by an electrical charging point and sees cars double parked waiting to be charged will not be encouraged to transition to an electric car. Mount Street is only a short distance away and it might be good for the Minister's mind and his general health to go for that walk.

Dublin has seen a considerable increase in the number of people cycling or walking in the city, with approximately 17% of all journeys being done by cyclists or pedestrians. We need pedestrians to be prioritised in our major urban centres. The footpaths across our capital city, in Cork, Galway and Limerick are in a terrible state. Considerable numbers of people have tripped and fallen and the situation is particularly bad for people with mobility problems. In terms of any investment plan, there must be some level of prioritisation for pedestrians. We must invest in improving our footpaths. While it was unfortunate in one sense, in many ways it is good that we did not win the right to host the Rugby World Cup. If one walks on the footpath from Haddington Road to the Aviva stadium one will see cracks and lifts of up to six inches. Anyone with a mobility problem travelling to the Aviva in the dark is quite likely to fall over. Indeed, many pedestrians going about their daily lives, whether going to mass or bringing young children to school, face challenges on the footpaths, such is their poor condition. It is no wonder that a lot of parents prefer to take their children to school by car.

The dublinbikes scheme has been a game-changer and similar schemes have been rolled out in other cities. These bike schemes have encouraged more people to get onto bikes and to cycle in our cities and I ask the Minister to seriously consider a subvention for them. They are an integral part of our public transport system, as is evident from the numbers using dublinbikes. The next phase of the scheme should involve connecting our urban villages. We should be connecting, for example, Sandymount to Ranelagh, Ranelagh to Donnybrook and Donnybrook to Terenure and Rathmines. That would cut out trips into the city centre and reduce the number of car journeys. It would encourage people not to use their cars. This would require quite a small investment but it has the potential to make a huge difference to the number of car journeys made.

The Minister made reference to the redesign of VRT and the motor tax regime in 2008 by the then Fianna Fáil led Government, which encouraged a huge shift to diesel engines. Those diesel engines are causing deaths. Over 70% of cars purchased last year had diesel engines but the scientific evidence shows that diesel particles in the air in our cities leads to serious illnesses including Alzheimer's disease, heart disease and brain defects in young children. The science is very clear but we still have not tried to deal with that issue. We are now also seeing a lot of diesel engine vehicles being imported from England. In that context, I ask the Minister to examine the impact of diesel engine vehicles in cities and towns. The former Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, former Deputy Mary Harney, will always be remembered for banning smoky coal in Dublin. There was uproar at the time but we have seen the health benefits of that decision. I urge the Minister to be progressive in the context of diesel engines. I am not suggesting an immediate ban but rather a series of steps to reduce the number of diesel engine vehicles in our cities.

Finally, I make a plea to the Minister to invest in public transport. In particular, I urge him to invest in the electrification of our train routes and the Dublin Bus fleet. His priority should not be to build roads but to build a sustainable public transport network. If that is his legacy at the end of his tenure, he will be held in high regard in future years.