Paraic Brady (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State. I will not rehash everything everybody has said. I agree with it. I will just say one thing to the Minister of State. It is coming to the stage now where young people will not actually wait to get their driving test. Perhaps they have secured employment and the mother and father are no longer fit to bring these people to work at 7.30 or eight o'clock in the morning, so now we see young people actually going to work without having done their driving test. We are actually forcing our youths onto the roads without a full driver's licence because the system has failed. We have had several cases in Longford disclosed in the past week. We have a young fella who is after getting into the fire services. He was told that if he does not have a full licence, he does not pick up the job. Another girl is a teacher in a school in Newtown Forbes and her parents have to drive from Abbeylara to Newtown Forbes every day, down and back, and pick her up. It is unacceptable that we have people working in the HSE who have not got their driver's licence. We need to prioritise people in these sectors. Teachers, fire services personnel and those working in the HSE have to get priority over everybody else because they work in a sector that is in need of them.

I just hope we can get a handle on this. I agree with the sentiments expressed by everyone else here. If somebody is fit to teach somebody, they should also be fit to instruct on whether they have passed or whether they have failed. Perhaps we need to take some driving instructors from several other counties and move them to a different county where instructors are needed. We need to speed up this process and try to get these people onto the roads in a safe and due manner - these and everybody else. I thank the Minister of State for his time.