Pauline O'Reilly (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Senator Chambers has been unavoidably detained, so I will be taking the Commencement matter on behalf of both of us. Senator Chambers and I raised this issue on the Order of Business and the Leader suggested that we jointly raise a Commencement matter. I am representing both of us. I know the issue is one Senator Chambers feels passionately about for her own county of Mayo. For me, it is about climate, the economy of the north west and joined-up thinking on transport.

I believe, fundamentally, that we can have a rail link and a greenway that goes along the western rail track. I ask the Minister of State to seek to progress phases 2 and 3 of the western rail corridor development. The most recent report on this project, authored by Dr. Bradley, is 200 pages long. I hope the Minister of State has read it. I am sure he has. The report has highlighted many discrepancies and inaccuracies in the EY report on the western rail corridor that was commissioned by the Department. West on Track, a group of volunteers from counties Galway and Mayo, looked at the EY report in February, as the Minister of State might recall. The group found there were 324 numerical errors, 31 typos and 23 errors of fact, some of which were very serious, in the report. The latest report by Dr. Bradley shows that the capital costs of the reopening are 50% lower than those quoted in the EY report.

Will the Minister of State outline what the Department is going do to on this issue and how we can move forward? The development of western rail corridor is not just about how many people are there currently. It is fundamentally about taking a transport-first and town-centre-first approach to planning. The transport needs to be put in place to deliver the planning and development the Government wants. It is very much Green Party policy that if there is rail and that rail is viable, it should be developed first. Otherwise, we will see a continuation of sprawl, which we do not want.

I know the Department is putting funding into the double-tracking of the Athenry to Galway rail link. The western rail corridor would link that double-tracking with Claremorris and the Mayo-Dublin line.From many points of view, therefore, this is important. It is important to the economy because tourists come to Galway. How do we move them up to the north west? We have three regions in this country, and the north west is the only one that is designated as a region in transition economically by the EU. The other two regions are seen as doing very well economically and the north west is not. Many will disagree with how well some of the regions are doing, but this is a European standard. If we want to get the industry and the tourism, we have to put in place the infrastructure. Quite apart from that, this report showed there would be 5.5 million km less in road trips per annum by 2030. Therefore, from a climate point of view, we would see a reduction in the number of cars. We would also see a 2.8 million km per annum reduction in HGV traffic because that line could take a lot of haulage.

I would love the hear what the Minister of State will say about this, how the Department will rectify the errors and the moving forward with phases two and three.