Maire Devine (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the safe location of the school children and their coach in a cave in Thailand. The drama is still unfolding and there are difficulties ahead but we wish them a full and successful recovery.

I also wish to raise BusConnects. I attended the briefing yesterday and apparently more than 80% of Dubliners believe that change is needed for a better bus service in the capital city. Hopefully, that will go smoothly but the public consultation is to commence on 16 July and cease on 14 September. Along with some of my colleagues yesterday I impressed on the NTA and Dublin Bus that the public consultation should not take place in the summer months when most Dubliners will be away on holiday. Cynics would say that a great deal of public consultation takes place at Christmas time, Easter time or during the summer holidays. It will not achieve the responses we need and will not generate the inclusion and ownership by Dubliners of this public consultation if most of them are unaware of it or are unavailable to do it. I plead with the Leader to ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport to intervene and extend the public consultation period. It is intended to examine the appropriate public transport for Dublin so we need everybody's voice at it.

The other issue is that Dublin Bus has invested in a fleet that is diesel hybrid. Diesel has a bad rap and it is a pollutant. Even if the hybrid is an improvement the diesel part of the exchange is not. Millions of people and thousands of cities worldwide have successfully adopted 100% electric public transport. Perhaps the Minister could also address why Dublin Bus is not purchasing an electric fleet as opposed to using the diesel pollutant.