Bríd Smith Criticises NTA Over Bus Capacity and Private Competition

Minister, I'm going to ask you about your plans to increase the services in Dublin Bus and Bus Eireann and although I know you are going to give me good news and talk about the increases and they are welcome, I think it's worth highlighting that even before Covid we had a national crisis in our bus transport system. 2019 saw a huge increase in the numbers using public transport but now we are literally running to stand still and only recovering from the austerity years. Add into that the need for capacity at peak hours, particularly for essential workers, I'd like you to address in that context please. Thank you very much indeed Deputy Smith. The Deputy is aware that there are ambitious plans to expand bus services in all our cities through implementation of Bus Connects which will see improved services, better infrastructure and larger bus fleets. This type of transformative change is needed and if we are serious about improving public transport then we need to be serious about our support for Bus Connects and the benefits it will deliver. The Government's ongoing support can be seen in the expanded bus fleet operating our PSO services now as compared to a few years ago. The bus fleet has grown by around 15% over the last three years and will continue to expand this year and beyond. Next year alone for example the NTA will purchase over 240 new buses for the PSO fleets. These will replace older buses with newer and cleaner buses but will also add capacity through replacing single decks with double deckers and also expand the fleet through additional buses beyond existing fleets. Bus Connects Dublin will see the PSO fleet in Dublin region expand by over 200 vehicles between 2021 and 2024 while the service improvements planned due to the network redesign will increase services by around 23% as compared to today. I want to see that ambition replicated in other cities as well. In the regional cities at the moment capacity has been added through replacing single deck buses with double deckers and that can expand capacity by around 25% per bus. On the regional services capacity increases are also being added through purchase of double deck coaches to replace single deck coach vehicles on various routes which will increase capacity by around 40% to 50%. So in 2021 next year it is expected that an additional 48 double deck coach vehicles will be brought into operation which will add capacity to the system across the country. Finally in relation to buses I would also denote the NTA's ongoing work on Connecting Ireland. This is an initiative to provide better public transport connections between villages and towns by linking them with an enhanced regional network nationwide. The NTA is commencing a two-phase consultation beginning with local authority officials and other key stakeholders on the main concepts of Connecting Ireland which will be followed by a wider public consultation on the proposals in Q2 2021. Thank you very much Minister. Deputy Smith. Thanks Minister. I just want to come back on a couple of things. First of all in relation to the ambitious plans to increase the network across the country. I think this is pretty shameful that you can say that while at the same time the NTA has actively encouraged private competition and run down Bus Aeron as a company. The recent announcement that Bus Aeron were cancelling three express routes was really that your lack of concern was astonishing. Because you don't seem to understand the importance of that decision for the company's future. I also think that we need to look at what the NTA are doing in terms of what I would term as a neoliberal experiment. Where they bring for example 10% private operation Bus Services into Dublin in the name of competition. But the only thing that is being competitive here are the wages and conditions of workers because everything else, the routes, the number of buses, the fares, the timetable is being decided by the NTA. It is only workers paying conditions that is the subject of competition and this is true also of the expressway routes being taken over by private companies. Can I first of all just say in relation to Bus Aeron and those expressway services, yes, which are due to not yet be removed. But it was done at the same time when actually additional drivers are being taken on by Bus Aeron where the company actually is expanding and I want to see it expand further. And there was a provision where new services, if my memory serves me right here now in Meath and Laud, where there's real unmet need. So that wasn't any expression of lack of confidence in Bus Aeron, far from it. It was the company coming to us and saying they wanted to expand in these areas and they think that deploying their resources in this way was the best way for the company to upseed. And for those towns that potentially could lose out, the likes of Care, Mitchellstown, we gave a very clear commitment that there would be PSO services put in in any such instance. I believe in public transport, public service, obligation services. And that gap, if any appears, will be met and closed. Thank you. Just to explain to Deputy, you will have one minute after Deputy Brief Smith because they are grouped. Deputy Brief Smith. You get a minute. Okay, just to come back on a couple of things. It's not actually the question of drivers. I am aware that Dublin Bus and Bus Aeron are recruiting. It's the actual number of buses, the physical buses that we need. And I don't see anything in your report that indicates that this is the sort of radical forward thinking that we need. Given both the COVID crisis and in particular the climate crisis, we don't have an argument with our population to use public transport. They want to use public transport. The question is, can they get on it? At the moment, we are finding health workers can't get home from work or can't get to work because of the lower capacity. I understand that's a particular situation, but this will be a problem in the future. Before COVID, we had people having difficulty accessing bus services on time and with the same frequencies. And there's a question of the cost. The fares are excessive and the fares have gone up hugely in the last few years. And really, Minister, I want to say to you that we are now only returning to the numbers in our fleet that were there before the fleet was cut in 2009. So it's not good enough and it certainly isn't dealing with this in terms of the climate crisis in particular. Yes, we will provide additional buses, but the key thing here is I believe the bus connects projects. Because that project, if we can deliver it, not just in Dublin, but also in Cork and Galway and Limerick and Waterford, will radically improve the service, improve the conditions and lived experience of the drivers working on the service as well. But it is the most important thing we have to get right now, in my mind, to make our bus system the cornerstone of our public transport system. Deputy Smith, I'll say, because we share this route in our bordering constituencies, I was looking in detail at the Cambridge route, for example, the other day. And I'll take that as an example, just by one of many that we could take along the 16 corridors that have been built. But I think what's happened there is with consultation with the local community, that actually a very different design has ended up being proposed to what was originally proposed. It is going to be very radical. It will take a lot of political courage in a sense for us to get this through, because it will very much advantage cycling and bus over other modes and pedestrians too. And I think that's what we have to do now, because the city won't work unless we really do make a bus system that works. So, yes, we will provide the buses. If there's any instance where we can show that the shorter buses is going to be the problem. But I think the real key thing now is actually getting the Bus Connect project into planning. I think it's March. We hope to get it in this final consultation. Listen, if there are changes, the NTA should be open to looking at them. But by and large, I think the network proposed the design solutions that they've come up with are the right ones. That will, more than anything else, that will increase the bus numbers by making it easier for the drivers, easier for the passengers, to kind of use the buses we have. So, I think that's the key measure we need to get right in the next year. Minister, next question. Thank you. Thank you.