John McGahon (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair. I will focus on a couple of projects that are local to the Chair, Deputy O'Dowd, and me by giving my own thoughts and asking for the witnesses' opinions on them. I will start with the Enterprise train service. The Chair, coming from Drogheda as he does, will be aware of this himself. I will make two points. First, I am aware of it because I am a regular train user myself. I use it to get here. I use it to get to work and have been using it for the last ten years. I actually introduced a Private Member's Bill this week that proposes to offer refunds when trains are delayed. The reason I am doing that is that the enterprise is regularly delayed, it is regularly late. There are people getting on in my town of Dundalk or the Cathaoirleach's town of Drogheda who are paying full whack for a ticket and have no seating. Just this morning for example, a good friend of mine, Tom Quigley, who gets the train all the time is waiting for a train that is late again for the third time this week. He is now going into work late again for the third time this week having to make excuses. That is not good enough for the type of transport that we want, particularly between Dublin and Belfast which in my view, is the economic engine for the island of Ireland. It is how we have a number of people in employment, it is how we have a huge number of educational opportunities and I know I am being parochial because I am in the middle of it, but it is an important part of this island. My question is with the €12.5 million funding that you are putting in and the work that you are doing with the Department of Transport both in the North and the South. Would you be confident that that money is going to be enough at this stage to be able to increase the capacity and the frequency so that we can see to it that there are no longer substantial delays or people standing on trains from Newry, Dundalk or Drogheda? I would be interested in that. It is an excellent project and when I see things like this I get excited about them, particularly when it is going to come through by Q1 of 2025, but I would love to know the data behind that and how you can be certain that that is going to resolve a lot of the issues, in the first instance.

Secondly, when I look at the Narrow Water Bridge and again Deputy O'Dowd would be very aware of this, I believe this is going to exist because of the work done by Shared Island and the commitment the Government have put towards it and because Louth County Council kept it alive for a number years when it had died a death in 2013. It is great to see now everybody from all political parties involved, it reminds me of that quote "Success has 1,000 father". That is happening with the Narrow Water Bridge, everyone is responsible for building it. It is important to have people from all political persuasions on both sides of the Border supporting it, but I think it is the Shared Island Unit that is responsible for building it because to be able to put that level of funding behind it which is probably the most significant amount of funding, is going to make it a success and is going to make it a reality. I do want to put on the record that it is because of the work that they have put into it.

My view is that I am more concerned with the rail line side of it, that that may not live up to expectations. I do not have any of those concerns with the Narrow Water Bridge because that has moved to such a point at this stage that it is going ahead and it is going to be really good. My question relates back to the train services and how can the witnesses be sure that that funding is enough and how will the organisation come up with that data where that funding comes along?