Michelle Mulherin (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I fully support the call by my colleague, Senator Paddy Burke, for a debate on the strategy for our railway services. It is timely that we would have that debate now. As Senator Lombard pointed out, last week we launched our climate action report after seven months of hearing witnesses and deliberations. It will chart our way forward to decarbonise our economy. A key issue in that is decarbonising transport, and without a doubt, railways have a big part to play in it. For a considerable period of time, when there was no money in the country owing to our economic situation and our banking situation, which was about a 15-year period, there was no proper investment into railways. Now, as we are beginning to invest in rolling stock in the lines and in the engines and carriages, we want to make sure that they are investing green, they are being supported in doing so and that it is part of the solution in reducing our carbon emissions.

We also need to address other issues with our railways, particularly with journey times, especially into the west and into Mayo so that there would be shorter journey times, more services to make it more practical for people to use and an improvement in capacity because often there is not enough space for passengers on trains. It is becoming chronic at certain times of the week and that really is not acceptable. Our investment in railways also ties into our economic growth and development. I mention the issue of West on Track, which would see a rail line going up pretty much along the western seaboard or charting a path along what we call the Atlantic economic corridor, which is obviously a notion or a proposition. To back it up we need to see this rail infrastructure which would not just take passenger services but freight services as well. I would like to see further development of the freight service within Ballina, which is the second largest freight yard in the country. It needs upgrading and new facilities and it has great potential to take some of our freight off the road. It is a very interesting topic and it is very timely. As a priority of business for this House, it is a good opportunity for us to discuss the importance of and the need to invest in our railways in this House in order to see some results from it.