Brian Stanley urges end to over-70s driver ban and school transport boost

Thank you. Firstly, to welcome the eight proposals in this motion put forward by Deputy Gorman. I think they are very welcome and timely. If you look at the very important ones, I think, are to reduce fares further, to connect Ireland's rural bus transport programme, to further accelerate that. I think you mentioned the All-Ireland Rail Strategy. I think it is important, as we move towards the reunification of the National Territory, that that has stepped up as a practical measure, I think, in terms of connecting north and south, and particularly connecting the north-west, Donegal and Derry and Sligo further, and Fermanagh and those counties. We have a lot of catching up to do because the transport sector is accounting for 42 per cent of all energy used, and the Climate Change Advisory Advisory Council has again set out today that we must reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent, at least by 2030. You know, we should even be more ambitious about that, and there is huge ground to be met up there. The school transport sector, and in the Climate Change Advisory Council's report, again to highlight this today, that it notes that 773,000 primary and post-primary pupils, only 172,000, 18 per cent have access to school transport, and we can see the difference when the schools are on holidays. You know, mornings and afternoons, the level of traffic on the roads, in all towns, villages and in Dublin, it reduces dramatically. And we must change that, one in five car journeys is for the purpose of getting children to school. You know, so we can see what needs to be done here. We need to drastically improve and expand the school transport system, but you can't do it, Minister, because you haven't got the drivers. You don't have the drivers, and the bus operators will tell you this throughout the country. And one of the things that you need to do is, is to deal with this ban that Bus Aaron have for their services and contracted services for those over 70 years of age. There's a review, the Taoiseach agreed with me on the Florida Dáil, the Transport Minister, Daryl O'Brien, as far as I know, agreed with me, and I think you agree with me as well, that we need to sort this out. And there's eight weeks to sort it out. Eight weeks. I've been bringing this up since the first day the Dáil sat here, after the new government was formed, and we need to sort it out. The review is completed. How many times does it have to be shuffled around between civil servants and their advisors and everybody else? We need to sort this. If those people between 70 and 75, let them go to the 75 and drive school buses, provided they pass the strict medical tests and eyesight tests every year, they're driving private coaches with 52 and 72 and 78 passengers. Why can't they drive a minibus full of kids to school in the local school in Shanahoe or Abbey Leakes or Ballyroan or anywhere else, or other villages and towns around the country? So we need to sort that. It would dramatically improve the number of drivers available. I also want to say to you that we need to keep cash payments. While I support the move to cashless payments and contactless payments, we should also retain the option of cash. I think it's very important. Some of us would prefer to use cash when at all possible, particularly for people who don't have bank cards and use phones and all that for payments. I also want to say to you that just in relation to the passenger experience that has been mentioned already, the transport system has improved. There's no doubt that public transport has improved. I want to acknowledge that. And the train services have improved. Out of Port Leach, there are a huge number of trains. There are trains on the hour. Sometimes there are two every hour. And that's improved dramatically. But there's one toilet in the station. One toilet. Sometimes it's not operational. You know, there is one small bus shelter, sorry, one small weather shelter on the platform, on the upbound platform. And there could be two or three hundred people standing there sometimes. You know, so if it rains, most people, 90% on the platform are standing out in the rain. And that needs to change. You know, there are simple things like that that we need to do. Simple shelters for people to stand under while they're waiting for the train. And could I just say as well, just want to welcome the local bus service in Port Leach. It's been rolled out in recent months. It's been proved a great success. It's fantastic. Some days I can come here by walking 100 yards from my front door, getting on a bus, getting to the railway station, hopping off the, getting the train into Dublin and walking across, walking out of the station and getting onto another bus, which drops me just down the road here. You know, so I want to acknowledge that. The bus service in Port Leach has been fantastic, but we need to see more of that rolled out. But do tackle this over-70s nonsense. You need to sort this. You have a few weeks to sort to administer. We're depending on you to do this. Thank you. Go raibh. Go raibh. Go raibh.