Jerry Buttimer (Cork South-Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Clifford-Lee for her contribution and for raising very valid points, in particular on the price differentiation. She is right about the Dublin commuter zone. I am taking this matter on behalf of the Minister, Deputy O'Brien. I thank Senator Clifford-Lee for her constant advocacy for public transport and for the people in Balbriggan and Skerries. I will take the Senator’s points back to the Minister. As Members will know, the Minister for Transport has responsibility for policy and overall funding in respect of public transport, but neither the Minister nor his officials are involved in the day-to-day operation of public transport services. The NTA has responsibility for the regulation of fares charged to passengers in respect of public transport services provided under public service obligation, PSO, contracts. The points made by Senator Clifford-Lee regarding the price differential are valid.

That said, the Government is strongly committed to providing all citizens with reliable and realistic sustainable mobility options, and public transport plays a key role in the delivery of this goal. To support this objective, in budget 2025, the Department of Transport secured €658.5 million of funding for PSO and TFI Local Link services, an increase from €614 million in 2024. The package includes funding for the continuation of the various public transport fare initiatives, as the Senator acknowledged, and funding to extend free child fares on PSO services to include those aged five to eight, and also to support new and enhanced public transport services.

In its capacity as fare regulator, the NTA published a new national fares strategy in April 2023 and following this, in January 2024, it published the first of a series of fares determinations related to the strategy. This was aimed at simplifying fares and introducing a fairer distance-based structure. I understand the Department of Transport is engaging with the NTA on the implementation of the second phase of the strategy, which will introduce more integrated and equitable fares in the Dublin commuter area. As part of the fares determination 2024 strategy, a Dublin city zone extending to approximately 23 km from the city centre and a Dublin commuter zone extending to approximately 50 km from the city centre, with Skerries and Balbriggan located in commuter zone 2, will be introduced. This area was selected based on a review of future public transport network proposals, for example, the implementation of DART+, along with analysis of ticket sales information to determine travel demand. Later phases will include the introduction of free transfer flat fares in the regional cities and certain towns and distance-based fares for the rest of Ireland outside towns and cities.

The new commuter zone will include stations outside of the Dublin city zone extending as far as Rathdrum, Kildare, Enfield and Drogheda station, including Newbridge, and will provide better value for passengers from these areas. The Dublin commuter zone fare is designed to ensure the cheapest fare is made available for passengers and will help alleviate boundary issues between the national and city fare structures. For example, for a journey from Newbridge to O’Connell Street, passengers will benefit from the flat fare element within the city, facilitating longer distances of travel at a cheaper fare.

Unfortunately, the implementation of phase 2 has been delayed due to a number of technical challenges, but I have been advised that Bus Éireann, Irish Rail and Luas are all working closely with their ticketing contractors to enable implementation of the phase 2 fare changes. The implementation of the changes to the rail fares is being led by Irish Rail and the work requires updating ticketing systems, ticketing machines and the installation of new Leap card validators at stations that will come under the new fares structure. The Department of Transport is continuing to engage with the NTA as it works with Irish Rail to minimise or reduce this delay and has advised that phase 2 of the fares determination will go live shortly, as the technological updates to rail ticketing systems by Irish Rail's contractor are due to be completed shortly.