Aisling Dolan (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the Minister of State is representing the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, but the services she has mentioned from the commercial providers go on the motorway. They do not go through the towns and villages we are supposed to be connecting. My huge issue is there are communities that benefited. Families, older people and students use that service. When the buses went on the old Dublin-Galway road the service was very well used and was the main route from Dublin to Galway. The motorway has happened and it has bypassed many of these communities. We are instead left with commercial providers that are of course going to go from town to town on the motorway, but what happens to the communities living in between the motorways? It is up to us and to the State to provide a public transport service to people who are not being connected by commercial providers. I am surprised it is going to take two more years, when we have an electric bus that has just been launched that is supposed to do a 150 mile-radius. It is less than 20 miles from Athlone to Ballinasloe. It is in the proposal.