Dublin Airport (Passenger Capacity) Bill 2026: Committee and Remaining Stages Dail Éireann — 2026-06-30 ============================================================ Ruth Coppinger (PBP), Dublin West The Minister is moving this with undue haste before the summer. It is absolutely wrong that a Bill of this importance is being guillotined after two hours and many of the amendments probably will not get a fair hearing. I will comment on this grouping of amendments, which talk about connectivity. We made these points on Second Stage. Balanced regional development has gone out the window. We also have a duty to connect the west of Ireland and other airports, such as those in Cork, Shannon, Mayo and so on. The airlines are delighted with this because, potentially, everyone will fly into Dublin and then be ferried on another plane to an outlying area because most people visit locations in the west of Ireland. The feeling of many residents in the area is that what is being attempted is to turn Dublin Airport into a European airline hub like Frankfurt, Schiphol, Charles de Gaulle and Heathrow airports. One of the principal reasons residents contest this is the lack of a night-time cap. All the main airline hubs have night-time restrictions. The combined total for the four airports I mentioned is less than that for Dublin Airport on its own and the night-time flight caps are not imposed at all in Dublin Airport. Planes do not make money when parked so the airlines are dying to get rid of the cap. I spoke to residents earlier today. Turning to the second amendment in this grouping, there are international duties and laws under environmental laws. If airport capacity is being increased, one would imagine that a fund would be set up for things like sound insulation and relocation for those who want to move, as some do. I have been told - I would like the Minister to clarify this - that has not happened and that residents have been forced to go to court because he has not met them about this. That is the very least that needs to be done. For example, the planning for real process was one of the initiatives that was set up. It was to get an expert planner to discuss it. The residents say they cannot get funding for it and that the Minister will not meet them. There are people who will be impacted by this increase, should it go ahead tonight, who are willing to relocate. Thornton Hall is an area that has been mentioned. It was not developed in the way anticipated in years gone by, and it could be an area where homes are built to facilitate people who want to move. All of these are very practical things that need to be ironed out with residents if this goes ahead, which, of course, it should not. What about the best insulation and air conditioning? Mechanical ventilation is mentioned, but people are not able to open their windows any more. Think of the effect of the heat we had last week on residents who live near Dublin Airport who cannot open their windows. All those people should have proper air conditioning. Residents are considering a polluter pays fund. The airlines are going to be the polluters, and they should pay for these mitigation measures. This is standard under any international laws. My area of Dublin West is obviously not the only part affected but Hollystown, Hollywoodrath and Portmarnock are going to have much increased flights. The Minister was on Fingal County Council at the same time as me when decisions were taken by local authorities to allow development at the outer limits of Dublin Airport. It is not that long ago. Now those people are going to find that the noise levels will be even more intolerable when the projected massive increase in passengers goes ahead. The night-time flights will be at least doubled. That is the estimate of many residents. Rather than 60, there will be 120. The aircraft noise competent authority is not fulfilling its brief. What about all the arguments around us being in the middle of a heat dome? Europe is enduring the hottest temperatures it has ever had. We will probably be in the same situation with high temperatures again next week or the week after, and much more frequently. We should not be passing a Bill like this that increases the number of flights. We should be discouraging people from taking flights. We should be reducing the number of flights in light of the climate crisis. Instead, the Government is marketing Dublin Airport as a hub on a European scale. That is ludicrous because we do not have the transport infrastructure to facilitate such a thing. We do not have a light rail system. At the very least, the Minister has to commit to meeting residents in an open way and to cater for overall the impact that what is proposed will have on their lives if the Government rams the Bill through tonight. That is the very least that should be done. Residents are not even mentioned in the Bill. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-06-30/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:06+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-06-30