Michael Collins
Cork South-West · Independent Ireland · Ireland
“This matter has been raised twice already this morning, but it is hugely important. I will make a personal appeal to the Taoiseach regarding Skyclarys and the further delay that has now arisen. Yesterday, Emma O'Shea came to Leinster House from west Cork with her mother, father and brother.”
“Another huge problem which normally arises in August is that relating to school buses. Parents have no way to get their children to school because of the nearest school rule. The current and previous programmes for Government contain promises that this will be done away with, but nothing has happened. The rule needs to be abolished.”
“Every parent knows that September has become one of the most expensive months of the year. While free schoolbooks are welcome, many families now face growing costs for other items. Parents are being asked to purchase laptops that cost €400 or more, make increased payments for school transport and pay charges to cover examination fees.”
“Either 25 children are left without a school place this September, or two senior infants classes are merged into one class of 34 children. Does the Minister of State agree that schools should not be punished for helping to solve an enrolment crisis? Will he immediately sanction the additional teaching posts required for St.”
“Education should not be measured by means of the distance someone lives from school, and school transport should not be measured on that basis either. I want to raise a matter that Councillor Bill Clear brought to my attention. It is a very serious issue regarding St. Corban’s National School in Naas in County Kildare.”
“I was chairperson of a board of management and know the difficulties that schools face just because they are one or two children short. That can be made up as the year goes on but it is a crisis that Councillor Clear finds unacceptable.”
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“There is a lot of clarity needed here. This is the sector coming back and telling me and this is what it needs to find out before it can make any future arrangements. Some of these people are going out of business. I know the Minister of State will say to me that the Government cannot control the price of fuel. Brent oil was $126 a barrel last night, which is an astonishing price. It is down to $114 a barrel now as I speak, I think, again an astonishing price rise compared to where it was before, namely, maybe $55 or $60. I have heard the Taoiseach and Tánaiste say that the Government is giving the most. It is taking the most. That is what they have forgotten. It is taking the most out of people's pockets. There is a projected figure of €9 billion going to be coming into the Government's coffers this year.”
“Will support be paid directly to operators or filtered through Department of education contracts? Are operators on fixed-rate contracts fully eligible, partially eligible or excluded? The same lack of clarity applies to Local Link services. Operators need to know whether supports will be paid directly or through contractual adjustments via the NTA. This package is a step in the right direction but it must be matched with clear, written guidance so that operators know exactly where they stand. A lot of them have told me that they are very concerned this will mean extra work for the accountants. We need the money to get back out there to the people who are delivering these services and are delivering food to our tables. If it does not, the food on the table becomes an impossible task to deliver and at an impossible price.”
“That means operators carry the cost through March and April, paying fuel bills in real time, often on tight margins and with a limited cash flow. Timing is not a secondary issue for a small and rural operator; it is central. There is also uncertainty about eligibility. The scheme states that the passenger transport operators may qualify. That needs to be clear. The Minister must confirm whether private bus and coach operators who are not part of the school transport scheme are included and, if not, on what objective grounds they are excluded. Artificial insemination, AI, operators have been on to me from all over the country. They are on the road every day. Are they included under some scheme? For those within the school transport scheme, clarity is equally important.”
“I will start by welcoming the package. There is no point in saying that the package has been announced and we are against those announcements. It took a long time. It was a huge struggle because people were bitterly disappointed that that struggle had to take place. At least, something has been put in place. I have other concerns but any recognition by the Government that fuel costs are putting serious pressure on transport operators, farmers and fishing is necessary and overdue. The funding envelope is significant and the fact that these supports are being backdated to March will be of some help. However, welcoming a package does not remove our responsibility to examine how it will work in practice because the detail here matters. While supports are backdated, applications for the road transport support scheme will not open until May.”
“The surplus needs to be focused on families who are at home, scared of the electricity bill coming in the door and not being able to pay the bill. Those are the facts of the matter. People cannot heat their homes on announcements; they need targeted supports.”
“I thank the Tánaiste for his reply. If the system was working, 317,000 households would not be in electricity arrears, with average debts close to €500 and 190,000 families stuck in long-term arrears. That is deep-rooted energy hardship and when the ESRI tells us that just €480 a year would lift a household out of fuel poverty, it is indefensible that people are being allowed to sink further into debt instead of being helped over that line. I see Government saying in the past week that it is forecasting a €9.2 billion surplus. Great news, and we have a rainy day fund. In 2023, it was estimated at €6 billion. This is a rainy day. It could not be wetter out there for the people of this country, besides the sun over my head right now. The point is that rainy day fund should be put back into people who are struggling badly.”
“Even with grants, that remains totally out of reach for households already struggling to pay their electricity bills. The reality is that for a normal family to fully transition from fossil fuels, the up-front cost is close to €70,000, and that is before the cost of a home charging unit is even considered. That is not a transition; it is an impossible one. My question to the Tánaiste is, will the Government increase the solar panel grants? Will the grants for heat pumps and electric cars be increased, and what is the Government going to do, in real, targeted, affordable terms, to help citizens of this country to exit fuel poverty rather than simply endure it year after year?”
“It arrives the week parents are trying to pay increased school transport charges. It arrives when the car is due for the NCT and needs money spent before it will pass. It arrives the same week someone in the household gets sick, costing €60 for a GP visit and €100 for medication. The Government repeatedly tells people the solution is to move away from fossil fuels but let us be honest about that and what it costs an ordinary family. To install a solar system capable of covering heating, hot water, everyday electricity and charging a car can cost up to €20,000. The grant is a measly €1,800. That is simply not enough to encourage anyone to change over. Then comes the electric car. Any vehicle capable of a real family mileage is around €50,000.”
“As of February of this year, almost 317,000 households were in arrears on their electricity bill, with the average debt approaching €500 per household and over 190,000 families trapped in arrears for more than 90 days. This is no longer short-term difficulty; it is systematic energy poverty. At the same time, the ESRI tells us that €480 a year would be enough to lift a household out of fuel poverty. That is less than what many families already owe. Yet, instead of being helped out, they are being dragged further under. We hear the phrase "choosing between eating and heating" so often in this House that we risk becoming immune to it. People are dreading the ESB bill landing on the mat like a stealth bomb, not knowing how they will cover it. That bill never arrives alone.”
“Energy poverty is not a theory. It is a reality in kitchens and sitting rooms across the country today. This morning on "Ireland AM", it was stated that households need an extra €480 a year just to exit fuel poverty. That figure is now backed up by new ESRI research published today, which tells us that 14% of Irish households, one in seven, cannot afford adequate warmth or to pay their energy bills in full. When broader measures are taken into account, up to 30% of households are experiencing some form of energy affordability crisis. I acknowledge the packages that have been given out but the pressure is not easing on families; it is getting worse.”
“I thank the Leas Cheann-Comhairle. I might beg your indulgence for a couple of seconds before my Leader's Question. I would briefly like to say "Thank you" to Brigid McGlynn, who is finishing in the Dáil today. I wish her the very best and thank her for all her work and kindness to us all down through the years. She has been here since 1980, so we can only imagine what she has seen and heard in these corridors during that time. We want to say, "Thank you" to Brigid on behalf of everyone in the Dáil.”
“Will the Taoiseach and the Minister for sport do everything possible to make this happen as a mark of appreciation for her dedication, her achievements and everything she has given to this country and to women's sport? It is what the people of Ireland want to see, and it is what Katie Taylor deserves.”
“Many years ago a young girl from Oldcourt in Bray had a dream. At a time when women were not even allowed to box, Katie Taylor dreamed of winning an Olympic gold medal for Ireland. She went on to achieve that dream in London in 2012 and in doing so she changed Irish sport and world sport forever. Katie has been the driving force behind the rise of women's boxing, helping to bring it to where it is today. As an amateur she won multiple world titles and Olympic gold medals. As a professional she has achieved everything there is to achieve, becoming an undisputed champion and widely recognised as the greatest female boxer of all time. Now, as an extraordinary career draws to a close, Katie has one final dream which is to fight one last time in Croke Park.”
“We have huge difficulties regarding areas in respect of which reform is still needed. I wrote to the chief superintendent in west Cork in recent days about a young child. We have been working with her parents. The child, who is 15 or 16 years of age, has been in continual communication with some kind of paedophile in the UK who is in his late 30s. There was huge upset in the home, obviously, which led to the child being taken into foster care for the time being. One of the parents is very distressed as a result of their daughter being violated by this gentleman. The laws do not seem to be able to protect them or put a stop to what is happening. The person in the UK seems to be protected by laws that Irish lawmakers cannot seem to cover.”
“England, Wales and Northern Ireland have already moved away from blanket secrecy by allowing accredited journalists, legal reporters and controlled reporting with strict anonymity protections. The evidence shows no breaches of anonymity, increased public understanding and improved accountability. The motion simply asks Ireland to learn from what already works. It does not call for open courts or unrestricted reporting. It proposes replacing the blanket in camera rule with controlled transparency, strong and enforceable anonymity protections, judicial discretion to restrict reporting where necessary, transparency orders that clearly define what may be reported, regulation of experts and stronger oversight of Tusla's compliance with court direction. This is balanced and proportionate reform.”
“Parents raise concerns about children repeatedly experiencing emotional harm, trauma and long-term mental health impacts. Children suffer when systems are hidden from view. This motion is about ensuring that child welfare outcomes improve. It is not about opening courtrooms to the public. The motion also raises legitimate concerns over the role of unregulated or weakly regulated experts. Court-appointed experts can have enormous influence, yet standards, accreditation and oversight are inconsistent. If expert evidence is to shape decisions about children's lives, it must be properly regulated, evidence-based and accountable. This is responsible reform. Ireland is falling behind.”
“Tusla exercises enormous power within family court proceedings. Its assessment and recommendations carry decisive weight, yet its actions are largely shielded from scrutiny by the in camera rule. In recent years, we have raised concerns about inconsistent decision-making, delays in implementing court directions, poor communication with families and an imbalance of power between the State and parents. These issues are extremely difficult to change when everything happens behind closed doors. Secrecy does not protect Tusla from criticism; it prevents improvement. The family law system exists to protect children, but protection requires oversight. Where there is no scrutiny, poor decision-making can persist, groupthink can develop and under-resourcing becomes normalised.”
“When a system operates without transparency, it operates without accountability. When there is no accountability, mistakes are not corrected and they are repeated. That is not good enough for families, and it is not good enough in the context of child welfare. Parents are telling us the same thing again and again. They feel silenced, disempowered and excluded from decisions that affect their children. Many of them leave family courts confused, distressed and fearful of speaking out even when they believe serious errors have occurred. That completely undermines confidence in the system. This motion recognises that parents must be protected from unjust exposure but they must also be protected from institutional silence. The motion also directly relates to concerns we have raised consistently in this House about Tusla.”
“I thank Deputy Gogarty and his staff for putting this motion together. It seeks to reform how our family law system operates, not by removing protections for children but by modernising a system that is too secretive, too closed and too unaccountable for the level of power it exercises over families. Family law cases are sensitive, but sensitivity cannot continue to be used as an excuse for blanket secrecy. The in camera rule, as currently applied under the Guardianship of Infants Act and the Child Care Act, has created a system that operates almost entirely beyond public view, lacks transparency and is doing harm. Under the current system, proceedings are held fully in private, reporting is almost entirely prohibited and parents are often unclear about what they are legally allowed to say.”
“This is a very difficult country for someone to make a profit in. They need to be rewarded for the work they put in. They need to be able to go home with a profit because a profit is turned around and put back into the business.”
“If it is good enough for a teacher to get paid, it is good enough for school secretaries. We have to be inclusive. We have to understand. I really do stand up for the small employers of this country who are massively struggling at present. We cannot point the finger at them because most of them are paying all their contributions and pension entitlements. There is a new one again this year that has worried the living daylights out of employers. A lot of them are saying it is not worth it. I see it in few cafés. I know that VAT is coming down and I welcome this but I have seen it in a good few cafés. Employers have told me they were working too but it was the workers who were making money while they were making nothing, so they are walking away from it. We cannot have a society like this. We need to encourage and reward people.”
“The Government put up a fight on the SNAs and basically it was getting rid of some of them. Not alone this but a bit of respect goes a long way. The Government did not give this respect and put the wrong message out. It was the wrong message, in fairness, but the Government withdrew it. It may not have had the intended effect but it frightened the living daylights out of parents, SNAs and those of us in politics who knew what the SNAs were delivering for the people and that the Government did not reflect this by rewarding them. I have been on a school board of management for many years and I see school secretaries. Deputy Boyd Barrett spoke about the Oireachtas TV company. It is the same for school secretaries. When summer comes, they are told to go home and go on welfare. This is not a fair reflection on society.”
“They may have the little comfort of going to the coffee shop and maybe going for something to eat at the weekend but this is being denied them because they do not have the money. The people do not have the money and it is a massive crisis in this country. I met a Nigerian gentleman lately who told me he has been here for 20 years. He said we have a beautiful country but it is badly run. I had to stand back and tell him he was bloody right. He stunned me but he was 100% right in what he said. He knew it and he focused on it. He loves this country and he works his butt off in this country. When I was talking to him we got into detail. The problem is we are badly run. We need to sit back and reward those who work mortally hard to keep this country ticking over. Look at the fight we had about the SNAs this year.”
“They could be up in Tipperary collecting a patient when they should be down in Skibbereen. Terrible wrongdoing is being done to these people. A new wrongdoing is bypassing the local Bantry General Hospital. I am well aware of this. I have been notified about it on numerous occasions. Management in the ambulance service is trying turn a blind eye to it. That is very unfair, again, to workers who are fighting for their basic human rights. That is what they are fighting for. The Government needs to sit up and listen and reward those who do get up in the morning, the hard-working man and woman who go to work every morning. Some of these people are even pension aged and are still working because they have to put bread and butter on the table. At the end of the day, when most of these people come home, they have very few comforts.”
“I see it in my own place in west Cork where people have told me they would work extra hours but they are not being given them. Then I am being told people cannot get them, which is only a fob job to get rid of us. I look at ambulance workers and there is talk about a strike next month. I am not sure how negotiations are going. Recently, I read that there are issues regarding pay and a failure over the past 20 years to update staff salaries to reflect changes in the responsibility in the workload. These people work under immense pressure and I know it well. In my constituency we are blessed to have people who work long hours, delivering for people and saving people's lives. They are pulled and hauled all over the place, wrongfully, behind an iron curtain.”
“These are such unfair burdens on people who are delivering and working for this country. They are saving this country millions of euro and they are not being respected enough. I have fierce concerns about home helps. I might bring forward something soon about the Government walking away from the old system that is there for the mainly women, who provide a fantastic service, and who are now being hit with massive fuel costs. They are also being hit with private companies taking them over. People from all over the world are working in homes where people deliver locally. They were there and they were always willing to do more hours. They were never given that opportunity and that is an abuse of an employee as far as I am concerned.”
“When I was at the fuel protests I spoke to many hard-working employers and employee. There was a unity at those peaceful protests. These were farm operators, builders, taxi drivers, bus drivers and fishermen. They were all either employing somebody or employed. They were standing together because they knew they were at the end of their tether and they could not cope any longer. They needed State assistance and it was not there for them. Obviously, people got angry and things got little bit worse as the week went on but it was not too bad in fairness. A protest is a protest and I believe in democracy as long as it is peaceful. What I am saying is that I do have very serious concerns. There are lot of home helps and carers who are undergoing savage costs. Carers are undergoing being means tested.”
“They are struggling to deal with the minimum wage even while many are giving over the minimum wage, and they are dealing with holiday pay, maternity pay and paternity pay. They pay out and pay out. They are telling me that they are barely surviving. They are struggling and many are walking away. We have to really find the balance here going forward. It is very easy for me to get up here and say, "Ah sure I am with you all the way and everyone is being wronged and everybody needs to be better paid." Yes, there are hard workers, those people who get up at unearthly hours of the morning every day of the week, fighting hard and struggling to survive, struggling to put money on the table to feed people, but so is the employer and certainly the small employers. We have to protect them also and we have to talk about them here as many have not.”
“Independent Ireland supports a lot of what is being proposed here this evening going forward. I would also bear the employer in mind. I do not think anyone has spoken here about the employer and the difficulties many employers have at this present time and which many employers have had for quite a period of time. It is about finding that balance between rooting out the wrong being done to employees in this society but still protecting employers who are trying to create jobs. Sometimes when we talk inside in the Dáil here it is like everybody is Dell or everybody is Apple, but that is not the case. There are people out there with four or five employees and they are struggling at this present time.”
“We were in the audiovisual room a while ago for a presentation on driving licences and reciprocal licences. People come back from America who had licences in Ireland. They are driving in New York one day but are not allowed to drive in Skibbereen the next day. It is insane. A report has been drafted and put forward and, in fairness, it is a good report. I would appreciate the Government might spend time on that. I could spend a day talking about these issues because they are close to my heart.”
“All the young people begging for planning are finding it almost impossible to get it. They are spending fortunes when they should not be doing that. They should be encouraged. These are the people who will turn things around and who will keep the local community alive. We need that to be understood but, unfortunately, that is not happening. We see the confusion now with the short-term lets. Lord God Almighty, it is as simple as one, two, three. On what the short-term lets are doing for rural communities, people will buy a little drink, they will stay overnight, they will drive around and they will buy food. That is what keeps rural communities alive but I cannot get that into the minds of the Government. They feel short-term lets are enemy of the State but they are not. These short-term lets should not be attacked by local government.”
“That is what I call them. They are gone. They no longer engage with the people. The councillors no longer have a say as to what goes into a county development plan. It was drifting in in 2014 to 2016, when I was a councillor. Councillors were having to "Yes" to officials and to play along with it. That is where we are today. We even had village nuclei between 2014 and 2016 in west Cork and they removed them the next year. The village nucleus was where there was a shop, a church, a creamery or a pub. You give a certain amount of area around that for building to give people a chance to come and live in that community and to build up that community. Sadly, the council, the Cork one anyway, as I can only talk about that one, ran a mile from that. It is like as if it is scared. It has every kind of policy to block you from getting planning.”
“With Local Link, a lot of new services were promised to the people of west Cork, around the Grange area and Timoleague. People do not have any transport services in places, such as Kealkill and Corthna. They have no choice but to get into the car to go shopping, to take their children to school and to go to work in the morning, and they are the people who are hit hardest with fuel increases. The Government is quite happy to slap it on. It is being watched closely now but it usually slaps it on very easily, without thinking of the consequences for certain areas. Certainly, rural Ireland gets a terrible beating with any fuel increase because we have to drive. We have to use our vehicles. There was also a discussion about the wastewater treatment plants. We want towns and villages to grow but the county development plans are a farce.”
“In my own village, I see people coming back from all over the world trying to spend money and trying to rejuvenate the community. It needs the State to make sure they do not lose the likes of the post offices and banks because if they do, this is where you are going to end up. If we look at the fuel protest, there is talk about a division between rural and urban. I do not like the talk about it but statements from a former leader, Leo Varadkar, are not helpful at all. They widened the gap there but we should be bridging that gap. The people of rural Ireland take the hit. That is the bottom line here. If the Government increases the carbon tax in the morning, those who will be hit most are the people who have to drive. They have to use that car.”
“Then I found out somebody who was trying their best to reopen it was not getting any assistance and was only being bluffed off the same as I was. If there is a real intent on rural-proofing all these sort of things, there is where the Minister needs to start. We solved the problem with the Garda stations. However, the problem we have with Garda stations now is that they are no longer closing but there is nobody in them. It is a clever backdoor system of closing them. In Drimoleague and in a few in west Cork, there is no garda working in them because no gardaí are appointed. If you do not appoint them, they cannot be in them. That also has a knock-on effect in the local community. The pub and the shops are closed and it drains the life out of them.”
“If you look at the closure of a post office, you see the damage that does to the whole town. I know it because I live in a community - Goleen - where we have lost our post office. That meant the local butcher shop went. It had a knock-on effect straightaway because everybody moved to the next town to do business. The bank closed in Schull a number of years ago. That led to the loss of a supermarket there within approximately a year. It has a massive knock-on effect. The supports need to be there. The understanding needs to be there. There are no great supports for the post offices. I was trying to save the Durras post office recently, and I might as well have been talking to the bloody pole because An Post did not care. It did not give a damn. It told me it was doing its best.”
“I beg the Leas-Cheann Comhairle's indulgence for a few seconds. I offer my sincere sympathy to the family of Councillor Joe Carroll, who died in west Cork, I suppose, suddenly enough. It is a huge blow. It is fitting that we are talking about Our Rural Future because he was a man who fought for the rural people. I was on the council with him for two years. I found him to be a gentleman. We might have fought inside it but we were best friends outside it like everybody else. I extend my sympathies to Sheila, Linda and Kieran and to the Carroll family and to the people of west Cork and to his colleagues who are brokenhearted because he was a joyful character to be with and to work with. I am a long time fighting for our rural future policy. I have looked at closures and the damage they do to rural communities.”
“Their report shows that a pragmatic, risk-based system already used in other EU states is both possible and lawful. My question is straightforward. When will the Government act? Will the Taoiseach instruct the Minister for Transport to remove the barrier without further delay?”
“Today, we will receive a report in the audiovisual room from Ireland's US driver licence exchange campaign on an unnecessary barrier faced by the Irish diaspora and returning citizens. I raised this issue many times. In November 2025, I asked the Tánaiste to liaise with the Minister for Transport to direct the RSA and the National Driver Licence Service to recognise previous Irish driving licences without an outdated ten-year time limit. This is a simple, administrative change. It poses no risk to road safety and will immediately support Irish people seeking to return home. This can be done with the stroke of a pen. The Tánaiste acknowledged that this issue is a genuine barrier and linked it to the forthcoming national diaspora strategy. Since then, members of the diaspora have done the work the Government should have done.”
“We need a serious discussion in the Dáil about the mental health services in this country. A lot of centres are closing down and buildings are being lost. It is a serious issue that needs discussion. I asked for it some time back and it has not happened. I appreciate that we would have a debate on this week going forward.”
“The Taoiseach is talking about creating a storm. This is a serious storm for the people who are facing a crisis at this moment. They are talking about signing up to something on 20 May. It is like signing a blank cheque. Are people going to have to sign up to something on 20 May, like signing a blank cheque? That is what we are asking. All we are asking for are clear guidelines as to what is going ahead. Are people going to have to sign up to something that they do not know what they are signing up to? There is no point in the Taoiseach saying here what way it might be and that this is the way he sees it. I am not in the business but other people see it totally and utterly differently. What they want is clarity. That clarity should have been there months and months prior to this.”
“Is it the idea to fleece them for the thousands in compliance fees while flushing a good going element of the rural economy down the toilet? Will the Taoiseach confirm for the House that the registration deadline of 20 May is dead in the water? Will he also confirm when the legislation will be published and commit to not ramming it through the House without proper debate and consideration of Opposition amendments? Finally, will he consider making the accommodation I have repeatedly asked for, that the established operators are treated with respect and granted a planning exemption in order to comply with Fáilte Ireland registration?”
“Last Tuesday I put down a Topical Issue on the matter but neither the senior Minister nor any of his two sidekicks could come into the House to debate the issue. Instead, I got a well-worn, stock answer delivered by a random junior Minister who appeared to lack a good grasp of the issue. Today's newspapers are reporting that the whole scheme is being kicked back to the summer or beyond and yet I cannot get a straight answer here in the House. There are rumblings of backbench division on this issue. If recent history has taught the Taoiseach anything, my advice would be that he sits up and listens on this one, if not to me then to those sitting behind him. The Government must not force families out of business for a foolish notion that it will free up thousands of properties for the rental market.”
“I raised this issue numerous times with the Taoiseach and others but the Government still went ahead and rammed through the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Bill 2025. I have highlighted over and over again since then that this Bill will destroy smaller rural family businesses across the whole western seaboard. The Government is trying to make criminals of ordinary decent taxpayers. The tourism committee carried out pre-legislative scrutiny in January. I attended and spoke at the meeting and pleaded with the Government to use common sense. The report is still not published. I have asked for a full debate on the issue every week since then at the Business Committee and on the floor of the Dáil but to no avail.”
“I want straight answers today on the delay and the disorder surrounding the short-term letting and tourism Bill. The general scheme was approved by the Government last April, yet we are here again with no Bill published, no final planning guidance and no clarity for the people whose livelihoods are directly affected. At the same time, tens of thousands of small family-run accommodation providers across the country, many of whom are in the rural and coastal communities we represent, are still being told they must be ready to comply with new rules by 20 May 2026. They are being asked to plan their futures, their homes and their businesses without seeing a single line of the law they are supposed to comply with. That is not good governance. Will the Taoiseach explain to the House why the Bill has still not been published?”
“All of my neighbours and friends want to leave Mizen Head and the Beara and Sheep's Head Peninsulas and get a bus that will take them to a train. We certainly cannot get a train. We had it, but we blew it in the 1950s. There is no point in going back over that. There are also delays in retrofitting, which needs to be looked into. Progressive politicians need to have a cross-party alliance, whether that is the Green Party or any other party. We all need to sit around the table and toss out the solutions. Let us consider buses that can be battery operated. We need to look at solutions and work on them to ensure we do not end up being laggards like we are.”
“On public transport, Local Link has done some wonderful work for a couple of years. Over the past eight or nine months, it has had tenders and has told us there is no money to run bus operations. The Minister of State, Deputy Canney, told people to walk to work, cycle and take a bus. That is nonsense for most people who cannot do that. It annoyed people and that resulted in the protests at the present time. I congratulate Damien Long, who bought the Viaduct bar and, it is to be hoped, will make something like we are used to at exits 14 and 9 in west Cork. It will be a park-and-ride system. There is no train for 18 miles in west Cork. In the next 12 months, we hope, people can go to the Viaduct and get a bus to Dublin. I want a such a service.”
“I am willing to sit down with the Green Party, and have no problem in doing so, because some of its ideas are very good. We need to marry them with the people who might be on the other side and have concerns. We have concerns about vehicles at the moment. I put forward a proposal to the Taoiseach two weeks ago about a battery operated lorry, something people thought I would not do, but the Taoiseach did not answer. The proposal was to carry out a pilot project in west Cork, because I know a person who wants to do it. Such lorries work in New Zealand and Japan, but Ireland will wait for 20 years before we will consider such vehicles because we might put forward something ahead of the rest of Europe and wake up to the realities of what is out there. This is where we are going. We need to sit around the table.”
“All it wanted to do was apply the carbon tax so it could double the number of cycleways up and down the country. I was canvassing in Galway last week with Councillor Noel Thomas. The people of that community were furious. Hundreds of households, not just one or two, asked why were there double cycleways. I agree we need a single cycleway and a single walkway, but the carbon tax is being used and abused as a tax to put forward fancy projects. It is the same as greenways, where people are saying their land is being stolen from them. These are hard-working farmers who do not want to give their land to have miles and miles of black tar put down through the middle of it. It is insane. It is time to stop these fancy silly projects and put the money back into the country.”
“He should at least apologise to the people of this country because he hurt people, and he does not need to do that. He is a former leader. He needs to advise maybe and not attack the ordinary people. There are over 300,000 people in energy poverty. How can we create a solution to this? Is it solar panels? The Green Party had to take the hit on this big time because it was in government. To run a home on solar power, and I have talked to experts about this, homeowners need up to €20,000 and they get a grant of €1,800. That is a pittance. The Government needs to encourage people to put solar panels up on sheds, on the roofs of houses and maybe on lawns. It needs to encourage people away from having to use electricity towards using their own power. That was where the Green Party should have come in and it failed to do all this.”