In line with the whole-of-government approach, my Department and the National Transport Authority have been working on practical and meaningful responses to the Ukrainian humanitarian crisis. From the beginning of the crisis, newly-arrived Ukrainians have been able to avail of free travel from their port of entry to the end destination on any public service obligation or Local Link service. Indeed, many commercial bus services similarly offer this assistance in getting people to a safe location. I was delighted to …

It is a huge challenge and it was always going to be such for Ireland and every other European country. We are not alone. We have taken in some 25,000 people. The State we heard today is housing 16,000 to 17,000 people. There are real challenges in that because there are stages. Someone might arrive at Dublin Airport, Rosslare Port or another port and stay in Citywest for a period, then transfer to another location. There is a significant management task in this. There is a large percentage of primary school childr…

-----are arriving within a short number of weeks but our goal is absolutely to make sure that it is an integrated all-of-government response.

The Cabinet discussed this at length earlier. The experience on a smaller scale but similar in terms of the need to give those integrated connections, from Syrian refugees arriving, is that local authorities can play a role, especially where they combine with the community, voluntary and other sectors. They have a key role in it. There will be a real role in terms of the director of services in particular within local authorities working with the community and voluntary sectors to provide exactly that sort of guide…

I recognise the importance of incentivising our young people to use public transport to establish sustainable habits from an early age. Setting public transport fares at appropriate levels is a key element to achieving this objective. The Deputy will be aware that a suite of measures is being introduced by Government to help with the rising cost of living, including a 20% average fare reduction on public service obligation, PSO, public transport services until the end of 2022. Currently, on all PSO public transport…

From 9 May, these 19-to-23-year-olds, those who are 23 and under, will also be able to avail of 50% discount fares across all services, including city, intercity and rural services. The NTA is working to assess deployment options in this regard. A working group is working with the commercial bus operators to see how this could also be rolled out into the commercial sector. Therefore, a range of measures is being undertaken, particularly for younger people and those who can access Leap cards. I refer as well to the …

I am glad the NTA saw the sense of what Deputy Matthews was saying about that trip. I happened to use the DART to Greystones a good few times recently for various reasons. Not only is it good value in that regard, but it is also probably one of the most spectacular train journeys in the world as one comes out of the tunnels through Bray and Killiney heads. This is not the only location where this issue has arisen. In Mallow, we studied a situation and extended the scope of those areas covered by the metropolitan ra…

The free travel scheme is a non-statutory scheme administered by the Department of Social Protection. It is available to people aged 66 years or over permanently resident in the State, and to all carers in receipt of carer's allowance. The scheme is also available to certain people with disabilities and people receiving certain welfare-type payments. The fundamental principle of the scheme, as originally envisaged, was to utilise spare capacity on public transport services which operate, in any case, with or withou…

I will, but as part of an integrated assessment and modernisation update review, including how we are providing school public transport. That aspect must also be reviewed and improved. I refer as well to how our PSO system is working. The many supports in place during the Covid-19 pandemic helped us to get through those difficult times. We now need to undertake a complete review of our PSO services. We will be doing that in a context where we are also introducing many more bus services, particularly for rural Irela…

I agree. In any budget discussions, ultimately the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform is going to have to help cover the costs here. As I said, in any Government at any period in time there are myriad desires, to pay for childcare, to improve our education and health systems and so on, and also to improve and increase the provisions for public transport, particularly those who are dependent on it and do not have alternatives. The answer is "Yes". That has to be in the balance of also providing additional s…

The Government is strongly committed to helping to combat the cost-of-living rises experienced throughout the country. As part of the suite of new measures being introduced, a 20% average fare reduction on all PSO public transport services is being made available nationwide until the end of the year. The discounted fares will benefit the hundreds of thousands of people across the country who use PSO public transport every day. The Government allocated €54 million in Exchequer funding to provide this measure; howeve…

The key is to deliver it before next September to benefit those going to college. It is equally important that young people travelling to work benefit. However, the return of college is the deadline by which we have to have the reduction in place for the commercial operators. Included in this is Bus Éireann. It is a matter of differentiation. Ideally, we would prefer to apply the reduction to every bus service straightaway but there are characteristics of commercial operations to be considered. We do not set the fa…

The working group includes three representatives from the Coach Tourism and Transport Council of Ireland, two further representatives from the commercial sector and a representative from my Department. It is up and running. I appreciate the Deputy's support. We will make sure that, in particular in areas like Ballyvourney, where there is nothing but a Bus Éireann service, people can avail of lower fares.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February is unprecedented in Europe in modern times. The war has, and will continue to have, significant impacts for the world, for the European Union and for Ireland. It has caused a humanitarian catastrophe, with millions of Ukrainian citizens internally and externally displaced. Efforts have been consolidated across the Government to address these emerging and urgent humanitarian issues in solidarity with the Ukrainian people. The invasion has also impacted Europe's energy syst…

I thank the Deputy. We support tougher and stiffer sanctions. I have had meetings in recent weeks in Berlin and Paris with other European ministers. There have been meetings of the International Energy Agency, IEA. It held an emergency meeting last week at which we made the case for tougher sanctions. That would affect other countries in Europe far more than it would affect Ireland. Europe has introduced sanctions on coal. That was announced yesterday by the Commission, as I understand it. That should not have a ma…

I will be dealing with questions on that issue later on. We have to be careful here. There will be certain short-term measures, such as the €200 credit that will be going onto people's bills this week. There will be medium-term responses to the crisis which include the likes of the acceleration of the retrofitting programme and the roll-out of renewables such as photovoltaic energy and other renewables projects. There are longer-term issues relating to strategic storage of gas. Although some people are giving consi…

I thank the Deputy. I will read out the formal response and then come back to her on the issue she has just raised.

The written response I have is in answer to the Deputy's written question. If she would prefer, I will focus on the specific issue she has just raised orally. I have been involved with energy policy for approximately 20 years in this House. At various stages down through the years I have said that one should always look at all options in respect of nuclear power. I do not believe we will turn to nuclear because it is too expensive, as we have a more competitive comparative advantage with regard to our own renewable…

Over the years, I have always made perfectly clear the importance of looking at every option and not being afraid of debate. Debate is, in fact, the most important and rigorous thing that one needs in order to assess all of the options. If one goes into such a debate saying that one will never discuss nuclear or gas storage in any format whatsoever, how will we then arrive at an informed debate and make the case that this is the correct way to go? As I said, the war has changed everything in that we are going to sw…

It is set out in the programme for Government, which we are now pursuing by carrying out the energy security study. I must return to the first key point as to the cause of this current crisis in high gas prices.