Flexible Work and Commuter Delays: Motion [Private Members]
Dail Éireann — 2026-01-21
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Conor Sheehan (LAB), Limerick City

Tá díomá orm nach bhfuil an Rialtas ag tabhairt tacaíochta don rún seo agus go bhfuil frithrún curtha isteach ag an Rialtas agus ag an Aire. I am disappointed for a number of reasons. I am disappointed because the amendment as it was presented to us makes no reference to what we have said about remote and flexible work. The Minister of State referenced it in her speech but the amendment to the motion does not reference that. We are lucky in one sense that we have the Minister of State with responsibility for AI with us because the amendment reads like it could have been written by ChatGPT.
We have been banging the drum on this for years now and we need a legal entitlement to flexible and remote work from day one for roles where it is reasonably practical. We are not talking about a fella going out to dig the road. We are talking about all the office workers who are stuck in traffic stopping the fellow going out to dig the road from getting to that road in a timely manner. We were told the world of work was going to change post-pandemic and I feel we are really going back to the worst of the pre-Covid world and forcing people back into the office for the sake of it. The current legislation is weak. There are far too many refusals and there is no proper appeals mechanism.
Every morning, people are piling onto the M4, M6, M7, M8, M50 and M20 and wasting their lives away in traffic while the Government wonders why that traffic is getting worse. My city of Limerick is more congested than it ever was. Traffic has gone above pre-2019 levels. The roads are absolutely choked. The Mackey roundabout and Ballysimon junction are both lethal. I come from Corbally and the traffic is well backed up as far as east Clare. We were promised BusConnects. It was supposed to be rolled out in 2025 but we will be lucky to get it by 2027 and we have no clarity as to whether we will get the full BusConnects or end up with some sort of Mickey Mouse diet BusConnects. There is also nothing about commuter rail in the Government's sectoral investment plan for transport in relation to Limerick. We have a number of radial railway lines around the city and there is huge potential to develop a network of commuter rail stations to take cars off the road. It is the same with a rail spur to Shannon Airport. All we have are measures that have already been announced like the double track to Limerick Junction and the park and ride, if it ever happens. We need the Government to recalibrate and reprioritise public transport. It was something the previous Government did much better than the current one does.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-01-21/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-31T01:00:51+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-01-21