Ciarán Ahern
Dublin South-West · Labour Party · Ireland
“What we are asking for today is simply that the Government lives up to the commitment made in the programme for Government to carry out a new, independent feasibility study for an extension of the MetroLink from where it is currently due to end in Charlemont, out to Dublin south west.”
“It examined quite a nonsensical route that finished abruptly in Knocklyon, and therefore it significantly underestimated the cost benefit of the project.”
“This all comes back to funding our schools. All too often, despite the much publicised overspend in the education budget, schools still have to fight tooth and nail to get the resources they need. I never predicted that so much of my time as a TD would be spent working with local schools on funding and resourcing issues.”
“As the capitation grant is not covering basic operating costs, many school boards feel that to avoid running deficits, which they will get into trouble for from their governing bodies, they have to find funds elsewhere.”
“As the Minister knows, parents are paying hand over fist for ancillary school costs, be it for school uniforms, laptops, school transport or the so-called voluntary contributions. We cannot say we have free education in this country if the whole architecture that enables proper participation is hugely expensive for parents.”
“Some parents are now having to pay hundreds of euro for devices if their children are to just fully participate in school. As this motion states, we are at risk of creating a digital divide and new inequalities in our education system unless we put further supports in place for low-income families. Kevin Shortall, principal of St.”
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“I dread to think where communities, particularly in rural parts of the country, would be were it not for the heroic work done by local volunteers and organisations such as GAA clubs. They really stepped up and a massive debt of gratitude is owed to them. In all cases, the humanitarian assistance scheme was inadequate. It either was not available or it was closed off in the blink of an eye. People were just getting over the shock of the crisis they found themselves in and the scheme was gone. It is absolutely imperative that we recognise that our strength as a nation lies not only in our ability to weather storms but in how we respond to the challenges they present. The storms of nature may be fierce, but the storms of indifference and negligence can be even more destructive.”
“However, I know from talking to my Labour Party colleagues and other Deputies outside of Dublin, particularly in the west, that it was and remains a very different story for them. There is serious upset and even distress. This is because of, first, the amount of time it took to get vital infrastructure like energy, Internet access and water back up and running and, second, the uncertainty around the supports that would be provided both during and after the event. I refer to supports like the humanitarian assistance scheme, which is dealt with in this motion. Households, communities, farmers and local businesses were left despondent for weeks on end and still cannot seem to get a straight answer regarding the supports that are available to them. The Government's response to this event has been a mess.”
“I thank Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion, which I am happy to support. Storm Éowyn swept through parts of Ireland leaving devastation in its wake, with homes severely damaged and businesses disrupted and, in some instances, destroyed. Farmers, who already have enough going on, have seen their livelihoods threatened. In the face of this crisis, we must confront the sobering truth that the response from the Government has been inadequate. It must do better. Where I am from and represent, Dublin South-West, is a part of the country that, fortunately, was relatively unscathed by Storm Éowyn. There were some trees down, which caused disruption, danger and minor damage to homes, but nothing arose that was not dealt with promptly in the hours that followed the storm.”
“-----was conducted last Tuesday fatally undermined our confidence in her and it is with deep regret I say that. I hope the Ceann Comhairle will reflect on this vote in a manner in which her political patron is seemingly incapable of-----”
“We gave the Ceann Comhairle the benefit of the doubt from the start, but the manner in which the business of this House-----”
“Rehabilitating Michael Lowry and ignoring the very serious findings against him is an act of choice by this Government and follows the grim line of denial of accountability internationally. We in the Labour Party and across the Opposition are righteously angry at the Government's grubby deal with Michael Lowry that saw the Ceann Comhairle appointed and logic turned on its head by Government-supporting TDs being allowed to pretend to be in opposition so they can perform on social media. The deal demeans this House and our body politic. It demeans and undermines the office and independence of the Ceann Comhairle. The naked politicisation of the role of Ceann Comhairle leads those of us in opposition, naturally, to suspect the Ceann Comhairle will act in a partisan manner to support the Government in order to support her own position.”
“Never engage in any self-reflection, and God help us, don't even consider any self-improvement." It means you can waltz back into power and control of this country aided and abetted by a Government and other Independent politicians who clearly do not give a damn about corruption and standards in politics. They will welcome you back into the fold under the guise of political pragmatism. It is not lost on us that today is April Fools' Day, nor that yesterday saw the beginnings of a worldwide far right campaign to say Marine Le Pen should suffer no consequences for the finding of corruption against her. This Government is trying to take the Irish public for fools but the public sees through this political stroke.”
“Nor should we ignore the words of the Taoiseach, with whom he has negotiated this grubby deal, that Michael Lowry is an insidious and pervasive influence who engaged in a cynical and venal abuse of office. This is someone who has had to enter into tax settlements with the Revenue regarding businesses he runs; and someone who has engaged in SLAPP - strategic litigation against public participation - seeking to use his wealth to silence dissenting voices through the courts when they call him out on his corruption. What does this say to the Irish public? It says, "Hey kids, don't worry, you can do what you want. Be as corrupt and as unaccountable as you want. Engage in tax fraud. Brazen it out for a few years. Deny, deny, deny. Never apologise.”
“It was a joke and that made it abundantly clear to us that the Government had no genuine intention of anything other than doing a deal with Michael Lowry. As we all know, the State has spent vast sums investigating the corrupt dealings of the Ceann Comhairle's political patron. He has received a mandate - we do not dispute that - but that mandate does not whitewash his past or mean that we can or should ignore the Moriarty tribunal finding that he engaged in profound corruption to a degree nothing short of breathtaking. Nor should we ignore his resignation in disgrace as a Minister and member of Fine Gael; or ignore the all-party, uncontested motion passed by this House that he is not fit for office and should resign as a TD.”
“In return for support in good times and bad the Ceann Comhairle was appointed from among the ranks of Independent TDs led by Deputy Lowry and other goodies were bestowed on his followers, including junior Ministries, deputy Whip responsibilities, goodies for particular constituencies and an open door with Ministers. It is entirely regrettable that the office of the Ceann Comhairle has been used as a bargaining chip in these Government formation negotiations. Indeed, the quid pro quo regarding the Ceann Comhairle was sealed with Michael Lowry and voted on in this House at the same time as the Government was purporting to speak with the Labour Party and others in opposition about possible Government formation.”
“It is a disheartening thing to see a stroke happen in real time in front of our eyes in this Chamber. It is a disheartening thing to have to speak on a motion of confidence in the Ceann Comhairle at all but particularly so early in this Dáil term and in my own Dáil career. This motion, this issue of confidence before us today, goes back to my very first day as a TD in Dáil Éireann last December and the deal arranged between this Government and Michael Lowry.”
“Part of the problem is that the pay and numbers strategy has effectively introduced a recruitment freeze unless they get rid of positions elsewhere. They also had two vacant positions at the end of 2023 which were then disappeared. It points to the fact that in our care system, those who provide the care, be they healthcare workers, section 39 workers, the parents of children with additional needs or the young carers who are providing care for their loved ones, are undervalued and underappreciated. The Minister has an opportunity today to do right by some of the most heroic but vulnerable members of our society - those young carers sitting in the Visitors Gallery today. I urge her to support this motion.”
“As a young mother with a child with additional needs, she got involved in advocacy work because she did not want another generation of parents to have to suffer through the same difficulties she had. That was 40 years ago, but the problems persist. She has spent 40 years battling for adequate respite, services and allowances. The battle continues. All of us in this House get emails and calls every day from concerned parents or carers who cannot access therapies for their dependants. In my constituency of Dublin South West, the need for more speech and language therapists is acute. I met recently with the management team in Ballyboden primary care centre. In 2022 they had five speech and language therapists. Today, they have one who works part time.”
“Ann cares full time for their parent at home and Barry helps outside of school hours. The demands of their caring responsibilities are having a huge impact on their education. Ann cannot apply for third level because her carer's allowance will be cut off if she undertakes studies for more than 18 and a half hours per week. Barry is struggling to study for his leaving certificate simply because he finds it difficult to find the time in the evenings, and presumably the energy. Both Ann and Barry suffer from isolation. They miss out on social occasions and rarely get a break, and there are thousands of young carers across this country, often hidden, who are struggling with little to no help. I repeat that our system of care is broken. I had an interaction with a woman recently and it stayed with me.”
“I commend my colleague, Deputy Wall, and his staff on all of their work in producing this important motion. I especially commend the young carers who are with us in the Visitors Gallery this evening, and who shared their powerful testimonies with us in the audiovisual room this afternoon. They should not have to be here, but the reality of our broken system of care is what makes this motion so necessary. Our system of care is broken. I have been struck by the lack of supports or even acknowledgements available to young carers and the effects this has on them from a social perspective, an educational perspective and a well-being perspective. I am thinking of Ann aged 20 and Barry aged 17 who both provide care for their lone parent who has an acquired brain injury.”
“Bíonn toradh thar barr ag tionscnaimh mar ghrúpaí WhatsApp as Gaeilge chomh maith. Ní mór dúinn ár seacht ndícheall a dhéanamh chun tionscnamh mar seo a chothú sa phobal, chomh maith le níos mó deiseanna a chur ar fáil do dhaoine óga ár dteanga dhúchais a labhairt sa chóras oideachais agus ar chuairteanna go dtí na Gaeltachtaí. Is trí í a labhairt a thiocfaidh méadú ar líon na gcainteoirí Gaeilge.”
“Tá an t-ádh dearg orainn i mo Dháilcheantar féin, Baile Átha Cliath Thiar Theas, go bhfuil Gaelscoileanna iontacha againn, ar nós Gaelcholáiste an Phiarsaigh i Ráth Fearnáin; Gaelscoil na Giúise i dTeach na Giúise; Scoil Chaitlín Maude agus Scoil Santain i dTamhlacht; agus Gaelscoil Chnoc Liamhna i gCnoc Liamhna. Is mian liom scoileanna mar iad a fhás agus a fhorbairt ionas go mbeidh an deis ag i bhfad níos mó daoine óga an Ghaeilge a fhoghlaim agus a fhás aníos sáite inti. Tugaim ardmholadh a thabhairt do na grúpaí éagsúla sa phobal agus na grúpaí comhrá i mo cheantar, Baile Buadáin le Gaeilge ach go háirithe, a dhéanann sárobair an Ghaeilge a chur chun cinn ag comhoibriú le club CLG Baile Buadáin Naomh Éanna. Eagraíonn siad imeachtaí iontacha agus ranganna trí Ghaeilge a léiríonn an fhoghlaim nádúrtha.”
“Creidim go bhfuil malartú cultúrtha agus meas nua tagtha ar ár dteanga dhúchais le blianta beaga anuas. Tá Pop-Up Gaeltachtaí, leabhair nua, podchraoltaí cosúil le "Motherfoclóir", ceol Kneecap agus a leithéid sin ag cabhrú leis an nGaeilge a chur chun cinn. Tá suim sa Ghaeilge ag daoine óga na linne seo, agus tá ár dteanga ar fáil do gach duine. Ní mór dúinn an deis seo a thapú agus seans a thabhairt do dhaoine an teanga a fhoghlaim anois, agus níos tábhachtaí fós, í a labhairt gach lá. Ba chóir dúinn tosú ar an obair seo sna scoileanna. An tslí is fearr chun teanga a fhoghlaim ná a bheith báite go dtí na súile inti. Mar sin, tá sé ríthábhachtach go dtabharfaimid deiseanna dár ndaltaí an Ghaeilge a labhairt istigh sna seomraí ranga agus taobh amuigh sa phobal.”
“It is encouraging to hear that. To the extent the Minister might be considering refreshing the EV grants, I hope it will be purely for EVs rather than hybrids. The transport sector is wildly off course. We feel there is a need for accelerated and urgent demand management measures and the implementation of ambitious active travel and public transport measures that can bridge the emissions gap by 2030. The Minister said we have reduced emissions, but we are required to reduce them by 20% over the period 2021 to 2025 and by 50% from 2025 to 2030. We would query how the building of additional roads rather than opting for more sustainable measures such as rail and light rail infrastructure is going to help us reach those targets.”
“It is really important that they are cumulatively assessed and not just on an individual basis. The Government has inherited an overshoot in the transport emissions budget as well as our broader carbon budgets. Due to the climate imperative, the previous Government had a spending ratio of 2:1 for public transport versus roads and invested €1 million a day in active travel infrastructure. Can the Minister commit to sticking to that? If the Government is off course in relation to emissions targets, the Minister is obliged to provide and propose corrective actions. What actions might the Minister take to implement the recommendations of the IFAC and Climate Change Advisory Council today in their joint report? Will he refresh the concept of EV grants, for example and reduce the cost of say, 700,000 new electric vehicles on our roads?”
“What will the Minister do to ensure the pipeline of road transport projects he intends to fund in 2025 are individually and cumulatively assessed for their impact on the transport sectoral emissions ceiling set under the climate Act 2021?”
“All of this needs to be done in conjunction with increased, sustained investment into public and active transport so that we are not so reliant on private cars, and that sustainable travel is available and accessible to everyone.”
“That does include opening new testing facilities, and I hope the OPW and RSA are working to identify potential sites now. We did have temporary test centres during Covid. It is obvious that they were closed prematurely. I suggest that Government explore the possibility of reopening these sites in the interim in order that the backlog does not worsen while new permanent sites are being identified. I will conclude by reiterating my support for the motion. It is a constructive motion, and I am glad to see that the Government may be taking it on board. We desperately need to increase the number of driving test instructors, we need to properly resource the RSA or whatever entity follows it, and we need new testing sites to relieve the pressure on existing sites.”
“The Government simply has not given it the urgency or attention required and the issue is compounding problems elsewhere in the transport system. As I have said previously, it is welcome that there will be a separation of functions in the RSA arising out of the recent review of that organisation. We need to see an implementation plan that sets out the framework of the new organisation, if there is to be one, particularly with regards to its testing functions and the resources being put behind it in the context of this motion. As the motion states, we need to end the practice of hiring temporary driving test instructors. More broadly, we need to ensure that the new entity is sufficiently resourced both to address the current issues and to ensure that they do not arise again.”
“That is nowhere near good enough. The Government has to take its share of responsibility. In April 2023, the then Minister of State at the Department of Transport, Deputy Jack Chambers, said that by the end of quarter 1 of 2024, the waiting times for applicants would be down to ten weeks. The following October, he said it would be mid-2024 before this was achieved. I believe that was during a debate on a motion on this topic brought forward by the Rural Independent Group, some of whom are now members of this Government. Perhaps they will have a word with the Minister or with themselves, because here we are almost two years after the initial promise was made and the massive backlog and wait times persist.”
“It is quite clear that there has been serious mismanagement by the RSA and the Government with respect to virtually all aspects of our roads, be it in the context of road safety or driving test wait times. As an aside to the matter this motion deals with, but not unrelated, NCT waiting times are also outrageous and are undoubtedly exacerbated by the delays elsewhere in the system. These need urgent attention as well. Ultimately, it appears that the RSA is unfortunately incapable of fulfilling its aim of a ten-week maximum waiting period for a test. The national average is more than double that. Looking at the data, there is not a single test centre in the country that is meeting the ten-week goal. In my constituency, the Tallaght testing centre is seeing waiting times of 27 weeks. More than 8,300 people are waiting for tests there.”
“Probably most concerning - this issue is referred to in the motion - is the knock-on effect the backlog and waiting times are having on vital individuals and services like paramedics and the haulage and public transport sectors. There is a vicious cycle emerging that is preventing us from encouraging people to use public transport. People are forced to rely on private cars because of inadequate or unreliable bus services, but we cannot improve those services because providers like Dublin Bus or Go-Ahead cannot get the drivers who are potentially waiting for driving licences. I welcome the comments the Minister made in respect of not opposing the motion.”
“We are seeing much-needed apprentices, for example, left high and dry because they cannot get their driving licence, and are forced to either pause or drop out of the apprenticeship altogether. Many people in my constituency of Dublin South West work in the industrial estates along the M50. There is very little direct public transport access to the latter so they have to rely on private cars to get there. Workers who are waiting for driving tests are being let down and are missing opportunities. That is before considering the additional financial burden being placed on people waiting for their test by way of the increased insurance premiums for learner drivers.”
“This poses a serious risk not just to those drivers themselves but the road users around them as well. This is not just about having a driving licence for the sake of it. Young people are being pushed further and further away from college campuses because of the lack of affordable housing. Where there is no public transport option available to them, they need to be able to drive to college or else face torturous commutes. The long-term solution has to be better public transport. In the meantime, we have to address the fact that students are dropping out of college because they simply cannot get there and many of them are languishing on a driving test waiting list. We are also seeing people miss out on job opportunities because having a driving licence is a requirement and they cannot get a test in time.”
“Between 2019 and 2023, there were 131 road traffic accidents involving learner drivers in which someone was killed or seriously injured. In 107 of those cases, the learner driver was unaccompanied. I am by no means trying to assign blame here. Obviously, each case will have been different. However, I raise this issue because the longer people are waiting to do their driving test, the more they are tempted to drive illegally without a full licence. The more they try their luck, the more chance there is that they will pick up bad habits that are difficult to unlearn. We simply cannot have people driving unaccompanied on our roads if they have not passed their test, and potentially in some cases, people have not even done the mandatory 12 lessons.”
“There has been a worrying increase in the number of road casualties in recent years. The figures have been trending in the wrong direction. I was glad that we had the opportunity a couple of weeks ago to discuss road safety. We need to improve road maintenance across the country, we need more enforcement of the rules of the road and we need to reduce speed limits. Ongoing driver education must also play a part. What is particularly stark is the number of young people who are dying or being seriously injured in road traffic accidents. People aged 25 or younger represented 35% of the fatalities on our roads last year, the highest proportion among any age group. That is up from around 25% in 2023 and 16% the previous year.”
“There have been improvements in recent years, which we welcome, but these have come at a fairly slow pace and have still not got us to a place where public transport is a viable option for most people. That needs to change, and Government will need to invest, significantly and continuously, in order that we will have the necessary infrastructure and that everyone across the country will have the option of using public transport or engaging in safe active travel. We recognise that, for now, private car use remains the preferred and, in some cases, the only option for many people. In that context, we need to get a serious handle on the backlog of driving test applications and the wait times that we are seeing. Ultimately, this is an issue of road safety. Some 174 people died on our roads last year.”
“My thanks to Deputy Daly and Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion. The Labour Party will be supporting it. I take this opportunity to congratulate the new chair of the RSA, Anne Graham. I wish her well in her role. I hope she is listening. I am of the belief that we should be doing everything we can to encourage people to use greener, more sustainable modes of transport. This means making sure that transport is available to everyone and that the option to travel by bus or by rail or to cycle is there for them wherever they might be going. The unfortunate reality, though, is that we are not there yet. There is a whole host of reasons people remain reliant on their cars, be it accessibility, connectivity or efficiency. In some parts of the country, public and active travel infrastructure is virtually non-existent.”
“I thank the Minister and it is good to hear he is meeting the board in the coming weeks and that he shares our concern regarding the continuation of the terms and conditions if the sale is to proceed. We also have to look at to whom it is proposed to sell this part of the State company. Killarney Waste Disposal is an unlimited company. There is a complete lack of transparency with regard to its group structure, its financial health and its profitability. Its accounts are not published. We do not know where the profits are going. There is a reason companies opt for unlimited structure, which is that it gives them much less transparency. We want to know whether the Minister is happy this strategic State asset is being sold to a company that has been fined in the past year for failings in the provision of its services.”
“Far from being given any guarantee about their terms and conditions, the workers have been told they will be held as they are for the transition, but what guarantees has the Minister that the terms and conditions will not be downgraded, reduced or, in industry speak, "harmonised" following their integration into KWD Recycling?”
“As Deputy Daly outlined, this is the last remaining domestic waste collection service in public control. We have big-picture concerns with the sale of this and what this means for the State provision of domestic waste collection services into the future. We also have very specific issues with the details of the sale. In this case, it is being sold by way of a share sale rather than an asset transfer, which avoids the application of the transfer of undertakings regulations, which would give some certainty to workers that their terms and conditions would be upheld after the sale.”
“It has been hugely successful. The model is already there. It is welcome that plans are in place in South Dublin County Council to roll out district heating in more areas and to start heating affordable homes elsewhere in the constituency. We need to see more of that, and I urge the Government to use the Tallaght model to roll out district heating and heat capture from data centres to other areas.”
“What is stopping data centres from importing and using more dirty fuel at precisely the time we should be moving away from this? The CRU must clarify in the finalised rules that data centres have to power themselves using sustainable, renewable sources. The growth in AI use will inevitably mean that the already high consumption of energy in data centres grows further, so proper regulatory and legislative frameworks must be put in place now to ensure that they do not impact on our vital climate targets. Given that the Government seems intent on green-lighting more data centres, we need to start looking seriously at using the waste heat they generate. The Tallaght district heating scheme in my own constituency of Dublin South-West uses waste heat from a nearby data centre to heat council buildings and the TU Dublin Tallaght campus.”
“It it is welcome that data centres will be required to power themselves rather than taking power from the national grid but it is hugely concerning that there is nothing in the proposed rules to state that their power sources must be clean, renewable, sustainable sources. We know that data centres consume enormous amounts of energy. Currently 50% of electricity produced in Dublin and Meath is going to data centres and more than a fifth of the total amount of electricity used in Ireland is going to data centres. The latter percentage is projected to grow to up to 30% over the next few years. That is more electricity usage than all the homes in the country, yet there is nothing in the draft rules to state that data centres must be powered with clean energy.”
“We really do need to concern ourselves with the amount of energy it uses and how this affects not just our energy security and the cost of electricity for ordinary people, but also our climate ambitions. It is in this context that I was extremely concerned by the proposed new rules regarding data centres published by the CRU yesterday. Quite frankly, the new rules fly in the face of our climate goals. Ideally, and this is something we in the Labour Party have called for consistently, we would have a moratorium on new data centres, at least until we can be sure that they will not pose a threat to or put pressure on our grid or pose a threat to our climate targets. Nonetheless, the Government seems content to plough ahead with them.”
“I do not doubt that it certainly can have some impact in helping us with things like tracking extreme weather events or identifying areas of environmental or biodiversity concern, but I am not sold on the argument that AI is the answer to all our climate problems. The core issue right now is whether these potentially positive applications of AI outweigh the negatives in terms of the level of energy it consumes. The reality is that using an AI tool like ChatGPT takes an enormous amount of energy. A search on ChatGPT uses around ten times more energy than a Google search. AI is proliferating rapidly and, with it, the ever-growing need for data centres.”
“I welcome this debate. Now and in the years to come, AI and how we effectively use and regulate it will be one of the key challenges we face as legislators. As my colleague, Deputy Lawlor, has said, there is enormous potential for AI to have a really transformative and positive impact for workers if it is applied in a fair manner and everyone can benefit from it. It is crucial that AI does not just become another way for big businesses to bump up their profits. I echo Deputy Lawlor’s point that we must take a human-centred approach to all this. I will focus my remarks on the climate element in the debate on Al. It has been suggested by some in the tech sector that AI has a massive role to play in helping us to address the climate crisis and that the positives of AI will outweigh the negatives.”
“The RSA, in its new form, has to do more and better. I really hope the outcome of the review, be it two new agencies or some other configuration, brings about a better functioning road safety authority and safer roads for everyone. I will conclude by giving credit where it is due, namely to the former Ministers of State at the Department of Transport, Deputies Chambers and Lawless, who in their previous briefs passed the Road Traffic Act and progressed the review of the RSA. It is vital that we now see the implementation plan published and expedited, and, crucially, that the new RSA, whatever shape it takes, be funded to properly carry out its mandate.”
“In health and safety risk management, it is imperative to eliminate or isolate a hazard in the first instance. PPE or high-vis clothing would only ever be proposed as a last resort. This approach needs to be adopted by the authority. The new RSA needs to bring in more expertise in road design. We know the Government is gung ho for new roads, so it is crucial that the authority builds expertise in safe design principles and has an input into the design process for any new road development. It is also crucial that convenient, segregated and comfortable active travel routes be provided alongside any major new transport infrastructure, including metro and Luas lines. That is without mentioning the chronic backlog of driving tests and the RSA's silence in public debates about walking and cycling infrastructure.”
“We cannot ignore the fact that, recently, more than 30 road safety advocacy groups declared no confidence in the RSA and stated it is not fit for purpose. There have been serious deficiencies and I welcome the fact that there will be a separation between the services functions and the wider road safety initiatives. There needs to be a culture shift in the RSA, though. The authority has often placed undue onus on vulnerable road users, urging them to protect themselves rather than actually making our roads and travel infrastructure safer and trying to change driver behaviour. There has been a victim-blaming attitude in the RSA whereby it offers people high-vis vests, meaning the speeding drivers distracted on their phones will not hit them.”
“It is something my colleague Deputy Duncan Smith has raised on several occasions. The RSA really has to hand over the data to local authorities after a collision as soon as possible. Local authorities need to know where the black spots in their areas are so issues leading to crashes, with fatalities or injuries, can be dealt with before any further incidents occur. I am aware that the previous transport Minister was working on legislation in this regard and I was pleased with the Minister's comments undertaking to further this today. I look forward to the publication of the implementation plan for the recommendations that arose out of the review of the RSA. I sincerely hope it deals with the shortcomings that have been so evident in that organisation.”
“I pay tribute to my colleagues in Dublin Cycling Campaign, particularly the south Dublin group, on their terrific advocacy on this. When we talk about road safety, we are not just talking about people in cars but also about vulnerable road users, including cyclists and pedestrians. It was great to see the investment and increase in active travel infrastructure during the term of the previous Government, but it is still too often the case that cyclists are forced onto roads because of a lack of safe cycling infrastructure. We need to continue building and connecting our safe cycling network and invest properly in maintaining it. If we build it, they will come. There are other, more technical but equally important areas where we could do better to increase road safety. Data sharing, as has been mentioned here today, is a huge issue.”
“That does mean harsher and stricter sentencing guidelines, as well as the potential lifetime loss of driving licence privileges for any driver found responsible for a fatal collision. I ask the Minister for Transport to work with the Minister for Justice to explore the scope of doing something on this. Another key element, which featured heavily in our Labour motion last May, is road maintenance and the condition of many of our roads. This issue is inseparable from the climate crisis. Increased rainfall and more extreme weather events are shredding roads across the country, and it is only going to get worse if we do not act. I hope, though, that the Minister acknowledges that continued investment in the maintenance and development of our cycling networks is also required.”
“People need to know that they will actually be punished for infringements of the rules of the road. I want to echo briefly something my party colleague Deputy Conor Sheehan raised recently, namely sentencing guidelines when it comes to dangerous driving. Deputy Sheehan raised the issue in the context of a decision to allow the sentence of the person who killed Joe Drennan to run concurrently with another sentence for a separate issue. I was glad to see that, just yesterday, the DPP decided to appeal that sentence, but it should not have taken heroic activism from Joe's family, in the face of unimaginable grief, for that decision to be made. If we really want to deter people from dangerous driving, we have to change the behaviour of the minority of road users who engage in it.”
“Before the recession, the corps was approximately 1,300 strong. After the recession, there was a massive drop, to approximately 550. Despite many promises for a long time, Garda traffic corps numbers have been creeping up and down, between 600 and 750. Getting the number in the Garda traffic corps up has to be part of the solution. However, significant investment in permanent, stationary traffic cameras is also needed. I was quite encouraged to see commitments to this in the programme for Government. This is an area where we could really see the benefits of automation. I ask the Minister to follow through on that and give it priority. We can talk all we like about penalty points and speed limits, which are obviously good and necessary measures, but what we are really talking about that will actually have an effect is behavioural change.”