Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 6 Jul 1966

Vol. 223 No. 13

Transport Bill, 1966: Second and Subsequent Stages.

Minister for Transport and Power (Mr. Childers)

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time.

CIE have had under consideration for some time past the position in respect of the continuation of the services on the Waterford-Mallow railway line. Normally, CIE could proceed in a matter of this kind by giving notice of intention to close the line under the powers vested in the Board by section 19 of the Transport Act, 1958. Section 19 of that Act gave CIE full discretion in the closure of railway lines, subject to the Board, before terminating any service, satisfying itself that the service is uneconomic and that there is no prospect that it could be operated economically within a reasonable period. I am advised, however, that a technical legal difficulty arises in relation to that part of the line between Waterford and Fermoy. While the services on the line are operated wholly by CIE and the lines and works are maintained wholly by them, they are only part owners of the section from Waterford to Fermoy. That section forms part of the undertaking of the Fishguard and Rosslare Railways and Harbours Company.

CIE and British Railways are part owners of the Fishguard and Rosslare Company. The undertaking is jointly worked, managed and maintained by CIE and British Railways under the provisions of certain old statutes dating back to 1898. CIE are responsible for the services on the Irish side and British Railways are responsible for the services on the British side, including the shipping service between Fishguard and Rosslare. In these circumstances, there is a legal doubt as to the applicability of section 19 of the Transport Act, 1958, to the Board's services on the lines of the Fishguard Company and it is considered necessary to remove that doubt.

In the course of my speech to the House on the second reading of the Transport Bill, 1964, I indicated that the Government had decided after very full consideration to preserve the railway system subject to such further concentration and reorganisation as might prove practicable and desirable. CIE have now advised me that they have carried out a detailed analysis of the cost of operating the rail services on the Waterford-Mallow line. They have found that the services are seriously uneconomic and they are satisfied that there is a clear case for making at an early date a final decision on whether to close the line. This situation obtains despite the fact that operating costs had been reduced by dieselisation. CIE have had to order a number of replacement diesel locomotives this year and, if the line remains open, they will have to spend an extra £344,000 on additional replacement locomotives. Apart form this capital saving, CIE estimate that a saving of £50,000 per annum would result from the withdrawal of rail services on the line and the provision of substitute road services where necessary.

Section 2 of the Bill is intended to provide the necessary statutory power to enable the termination of train services on the lines of the Fishguard Company in this country as if they were services on the CIE railway system. CIE will thus be empowered to terminate services on the Waterford-Mallow line, if they so decide.

I would like to give Deputies some details of the line and of the services. The Waterford-Mallow line is approximately 76 miles long, all single track, with 14 intermediate stations. The principal passenger service over the line is the Rosslare Express between Rosslare and Cork, which connects with the Fishguard-Rosslare passenger sailings. During the summer timetable, the express operates twice daily from Cork on Mondays to Saturdays, twice daily from Rosslare Harbour on Tuesdays to saturdays and once daily from Rosslare Harbour on Sundays and Mondays. During the winter timetable the express operates each way on three days a week. In addition, there is one passenger service each way daily, except Sundays, between Waterford and Cork all the year round. This service also provides main line connections at Mallow and Waterford. For freight traffic there is one train each way daily between Waterford and Mallow. The number of passengers joining and alighting daily per intermediate station on the line has been found to average between eight and nine. The volume of freight traffic originating and terminating at these stations is relatively small and could be catered for by CIE with an addition to their road freight fleet of seven lorries and trailers.

Mr. Dillon

Could the Minister conveniently give the 14 intermediate stations?

Mr. Childers

I have them here: Castletownroche, Ballyhooley, Fermoy, Clondulane, Ballyduff, Tallow Road, Lismore, Cappoquin, Cappagh, Dungarvan, Durrow, Kilmacthomas, Carroll's Cross, Kilmeaden.

Mr. Dillon

I am much obliged to the Minister.

Mr. Childers

CIE have advised me that if the final investigation clearly indicates the need to close the line there would be no intention to withdraw the Rosslare Express service serving Waterford, Mallow and Cork. This service would be diverted via Limerick Junction with 20 minutes increase in overall time for through passengers, who will still have the benefit of a through service without change of trains. CIE are satisfied that this arrangement, together with the substitute road passenger services for the areas no longer served by rail, would provide an adequate substitute for the terminated services. Substitute road freight services, based on Waterford and Mallow, would be provided for intermediate station traffic, and through freight traffic, Waterford-Mallow-Cork, would be diverted by rail via Limerick Junction. CIE are satisfied that these measures would meet requirements adequately. The number of additional road vehicles required by CIE for the substitute road passenger services is five single-deck buses.

As Deputies are aware, I have, in recent months, stressed many times that CIE must live within the annual subsidy of £2 million for which provision was made by the Transport Act, 1964. If the railway system is to be preserved even in attenuated form, it is essential that CIE should continue to seek all possible ways and means of reducing losses. The Board's costs continue to rise steadily due mainly to increases in salaries and wages and there are definite limits to the extent to which they can recover these losses by increases in fares and rates. It is, therefore, clearly in the interests of the taxpayer and of the Board's employees and of the general public still relying on the Board's services that the Board should make a final decision on the possibility of cutting losses on uneconomic rail services which can readily be substituted by cheaper road services and, as in this particular case, by better utilisation of alternative railway lines.

When the Bill was published, I received a deputation of the Deputies for the counties concerned. I have requested the Chairman of CIE to arrange for either the Area Manager or some other executive officer at Headquarters to receive one representative deputation in order that the Board may hear the case for the retention of the line. I should make it clear that in my experience over many years there is always a protest at almost any change made of this and other types but the Board of CIE will be able to make their final decision having evaluated the two conflicting sets of arguments.

It has been the general experience of CIE that people in areas affected by rail closures have found that the alternative road services provided have proved a satisfactory substitute for the former rail services and over seven years I have had very few complaints of substance.

I wish to make it clear that when CIE receive a deputation on the matter, there is one argument which I as Minister cannot accept. I do not believe that a minor branch railway line whose major traffic can be carried on a parallel line has any prestige value whatever in a rural area. If the line were to be closed provision would be made for redundant staff either by transfers of personnel or by payment of compensation in accordance with the provisions of the Transport Acts.

I will now deal with other matters covered by the Bill. While, as I have already indicated, CIE have a statutory obligation to work, manage and maintain that portion of the Fishguard Company's undertaking within the State, the undertaking still remains vested in the Fishguard Company. It will be necessary to provide for the abandonment of the Waterford-Fermoy section of railway line by the Fishguard Company if the line is closed and the purpose of section 3 of the Bill is to give the company the same powers of abandonment as apply in the case of CIE.

Section 4 of the Bill is designed to facilitate the disposal of the land of any abandoned railway line. It will enable CIE to sell by private treaty cottages and land forming part of an abandoned railway system to the tenants of such property. It will also enable CIE to include in the sale, where convenient, some additional land of the abandoned line in order, for example, to make the tenant's holding more attractive. It will be noted that it is the intention that section 4 will be deemed to have come into operation on the 9th day of July, 1963. The reason for this is that certain sales of this kind have already been made on the assumption that the position was covered by the powers given under section 18 (2) of the Transport Act, 1963, whereas in fact that section was not adequate for the purpose.

The purpose of section 5 of the Bill is to provide for the more expeditious handling of disputes arising in regard to claims for redundancy compensation under transport legislation and so to avoid inconvenience to claimants. As some Deputies are aware, there has already been delay in dealing with a number of claims. I have considered how best to remedy this situation and I am advised that the most effective and expeditious remedy is to give claimants the right to apply to the Circuit Court to have their claims heard and determined. Section 5 accordingly provides that claims, which have already been submitted to arbitration and which are not decided within three months of the passing of the Act, may be referred by either party to the dispute to the Circuit Court. In the case of future claims the applicant will have the option of referring his case either to the Arbitrator or to the Circuit Court.

I recommend the Bill to the House.

Mr. Barry

I was elected a Member of this House on 20th June, 1953, and since then, no legislation has been introduced that was so upsetting, annoying, discouraging or revolting to me as that which the Minister has presented to us now. What the Minister proposes to do, among other things, is to close the railway line from Mallow to Waterford. I would not mind if the Minister could give us figures to substantiate the claim that he has made of the economy which will flow from that action. Since I became a Member of this House, I have always opposed the closing of railway lines, whether in West Cork, Kerry or Galway. I intend to produce figures to the House which I would ask the Minister to disprove, if he can, when he is replying to the debate.

The last published annual deficits were of the year 1962. They revealed an annual loss of approximately £21,000 on the Mallow-Waterford line. That was a very low figure, representing £275 per mile. Let us compare that £275 per mile with the figures for other railway lines. The West Cork line which was closed was a line of 92 miles and the loss was £56,000 or £600 per mile. The line in Valentia, Kerry, was 40 miles and the loss was £54,000 or £1,360 per mile. The line in North Kerry is 70 miles. I understand that the loss in that case is £35,000 per annum or £500 per mile. That line is still open. Here we are talking about one of the most important parts of the country, from Mallow to Waterford and about closing a line on which there is a loss of £21,000 a year or £275 per mile.

It was recently announced that two-thirds of the CIE bus routes and one-half of the CIE rail routes are unprofitable. I think the Minister will agree with those figures. I do not know why the Minister should select for closure the Waterford-Mallow line, which serves such a large area and which is losing only £21,000 per annum representing only one per cent of the annual subsidy of £2 million to CIE. I do not know how the Minister arrived at that decision, as he obviously has. We realised when we were on a deputation to him recently that this line is to go.

This loss of £21,000 per annum could be reduced by one-half very simply if proper economies were put into operation. I wonder did CIE deliberately set out to show a loss on some of these lines? I know there was a lot of repair work done on this line within the past year. There was any amount of painting done in the stations from Mallow to Waterford. I wonder if all this was not done to create a figure that the Minister or someone else could present to the House to show that the railway line was losing money?

I am prepared to say that economies could be effected on this line and the loss cut by half. I am also prepared to say that if there were a more determined effort, by a canvassing campaign, increased traffic could easily be got. No such campaign was instituted and no effort was made as far as I know. An effort could have been made to increase the passenger traffic on the Waterford end of the line. As far as I know, no effort was made to make the passenger traffic a better paying and more effective proposition.

I say these things because I believe we are in a cleft stick. While this may be only an enabling Bill to allow the Minister to inform CIE that they may close these lines if they think they are not paying, what in actual fact we are doing today is sounding the death knell of the railway from Mallow to Waterford. There are many good and cogent reasons why I personally could oppose that, but before going further, I should like to ask the Minister one question which he will perhaps answer when replying: would he tell us what was the agreement between British Railways and the Irish Government made back in, I think he said, 1898? Would he also tell us the amount of compensation paid by the Irish Government to the British Government between then and now? These are very important figures which the House and the country would like to know. Some people have mentioned a frightening figure of around £1 million as the amount paid to the British Government. I do not say that is correct but we would like to know the facts and also if any compensation is to be paid as a result of the closure of the lines and the proposed closure now.

The Minister has said the traffic is not heavy on this line. I agree that it is not as heavy as we would like it to be. The reason for the absence of traffic is the absence of heavy industries along the line from Waterford to Mallow. Mallow, Fermoy, Tallow, Lismore, Cappoquin, Dungarvan and Kilmacthomas all have development associations and have been striving hard to attract heavy industries to their areas. The closing of the Waterford-Mallow line will greatly inhibit their efforts. I can speak personally about Fermoy. In the brochures we issued in the hope of getting industrialists to come to our town, we say that we are on a railhead and have many suitable sites to offer. I wonder if we shall have to recall all our brochures on Fermoy which have been sent all over the place and say that we no longer have a railhead there?

I want to remind the Minister, and perhaps through him, CIE, that for the past year-and-a-half factories such as Cement Ltd., Nítrigin Teo., Gouldings Albatross and Waterford Iron-founders and many other big industries are utilising the railway line to a much greater extent than heretofore, not only for the carriage of raw materials for their factories but also for the distribution of their manufactured products. I can see evidence at Fermoy railway station that there is more traffic in the past year or two in regard to raw materials for factories and distribution of artificial fertilisers through it. I am convinced that the Minister has no figures to show me what freight traffic there was at Fermoy for the past year and a half. If he has and can quote them, I should certainly accept them but I should like to hear them.

The Minister spoke of passenger traffic and we agree that it is not as good as we should like it to be. Again there are reasons for that. Should there not be much more advertising regarding the facilities there are for travelling from Cork to Fishguard or vice versa? I am glad to see the Lord Mayor of Cork here but I think many people in Cork city do not realise and are not told these travel facilities exist. I think there has been a more or less deliberate attempt to keep that in the background.

I made a note when the Minister was speaking that he proposed to have a few lorries, seven or eight, and five single-decker buses running between Mallow and Waterford. I know the road from Mallow to Ballyduff only too well. That is about halfway. Deputy Kyne knows the remainder of the road. I wonder what the Minister means when he says this can be serviced by seven or eight trucks and five single-decker buses. I invite the Minister to meet me in Mallow and drive to Ballyduff, either in his State car or in my car, and he will see the risks one incurs along that corkscrew road for about 30 miles. Corkscrew is the only description that fits it. I wonder, just to take that road as far as the Waterford-Cork boundary at Ballyduff, how it will be made right for the seven or eight lorries and five single-decker buses. Before CIE make any decision or meet any deputation —which he assures us they are prepared to do—regarding the closure of this line, I am offering an open invitation to the Minister to drive from Ballyduff to Waterford with me and I shall show him exactly the situation that has to be met.

That brings me to another point. Naturally this road must be improved if it is as bad as I contend it is. The road from Mallow to Waterford must be improved to such an extent that I believe it will cost an enormous sum of money. I think we told the Minister on a deputation that we already had two meetings in Dungarvan in connection with the proposed closure of this line. The meetings were representative of all sections and all political Parties and were conducted most sensibly. Deputy McAuliffe was present at one of those meetings. I do not see him here now but he may come in later. I remember him asking what it would cost to improve this road from Mallow to Ballyduff, approximately 30 miles of corkscrew road. It was reported to us that it would cost at least £3,000 a mile to make even a decent job of it. Where do we go from there? Naturally the Cork, Waterford and Tipperary county councils have something to say about this. From my experience of West Cork members on Cork County Council and of all the promises that were made before the West Cork line was closed and of the money that was supposed to be forthcoming to straighten the road from Castletownbere and of how crooked it still is even though that was some years ago——

Mr. Childers

The Deputy does understand that the through traffic will not go by road: the heavy traffic will not go by road.

Mr. Barry

The Minister is talking about the traffic going by Limerick Junction?

Mr. Childers

Yes.

Mr. Barry

The Minister must agree that that is 17 miles extra, is it not?

Mr. Childers

Yes; why not?

Mr. Barry

There is inconvenience and jerking and turning and switching at Limerick Junction. It involves a lot more time. Even if it goes by Limerick Junction, is it not cutting out Lismore, Mallow and Fermoy? I suggest it is the biggest consideration here today. We should be practical about the enormous bill the ratepayers and the Department of Local Government have to meet for the building of the new road from Mallow to Waterford. At an estimated cost of £2,000 a mile, I think the £21,000 per annum we are talking about here is a mere bagatelle compared with the cost of repairing and making a decent road there.

Would the Minister agree that there is a social as well as an economic side to the railway? I have always contended that the social is much more important than the economic side. I have already told the House about the economics, as far as I know them. The closure of this line will cost only one per cent of the subsidy to CIE of £2 million per annum. The economics of it are small but I contend that the social side is much more important. I do not want to hazard a guess as to what might happen if all the traffic is taken off this railway.

Experience has taught us over the past few years that, with increased traffic on our highways and roadways, the death rate on the roads is appallingly high. I do not want to say that the closing of this line will make it anything worse but I should be less than realistic if I did not say it is most likely to make it worse.

From the social side, I think we also have a duty to the people. I think that a journey of over one hour by bus is a bit too much. Anything over one hour's travel should be done by rail. Would the Minister not agree?

Mr. Childers

The Deputy is absolutely Victorian.

Mr. Casey

If he is, the Minister is pre-Victorian.

Mr. Childers

I am 2000 A.D.

Mr. L'Estrange

The Minister does not look it.

Mr. Casey

I shall tell you about that in a minute.

Mr. Barry

I travel a lot by bus, by car, by railway and an odd time by aeroplane. I believe that, for most passengers, anything longer than an hour by bus is too much.

Mr. Kyne

There are no toilet facilities on a bus.

Mr. Barry

Likewise, there are no luggage facilities. In Fermoy, we think of our people and families who have had to emigrate to England and our hope is that when they arrive at Rosslare for a holiday, they can come back to Mallow in some kind of comfort and when they are leaving us to return to England, we like to see them depart in some kind of comfort.

I have said that, in my time, this is one of the most revolting and annoying pieces of legislation I have met in this House. According to the Minister, everything in the garden is rosy. The people I represent in North-East Cork, and particularly the people of my native town of Fermoy, who have had this railway system for so many years, who lost all they had in their fight for freedom, will now lose the only bit of pride that was left in this town by the proposal to take the railway from them. I want to register an emphatic protest that any Minister of this State or any CIE group should propose to do such a thing.

I have been a Member of this House for 13 years and I have never before had occasion to become annoyed with any Minister, official or Deputy on any side of the House. I am speaking today for the interests of the people of Fermoy, in particular, and I assure the Minister that the closing of this line is a most retrograde step. He has many friends in Fermoy. On their behalf, I ask him to have second thoughts before he allows this Bill to go through the Dáil.

Mr. Casey

For the second or third time in recent weeks, it has been my task to expound the policy of the Labour Party on transport matters. I was quite disappointed, the week before last, when the Taoiseach gave a clear indication to the House, speaking on a Labour Party amendment, that it appeared that we had a personal vendetta against the present Minister for Transport and Power. I took that remark as being directed towards me because, in my ordinary duties as a Deputy of the Labour Party, I am the Deputy charged with examining transport legislation and with making as constructive criticism as I can.

I should like to start off by saying that I hope the Minister does not feel that anything I have to say or have said in the past in relation to transport legislation will be regarded as a personal vendetta against him, although I will say, straight away, that I think he is the most disastrous Minister for Transport and Power we could have.

The Bill now before us appears harmless enough. It is short. The main section concerns the closing down of the branch line from Mallow to Rosslare. The Minister will not get an easy passage with this Bill. The Labour Party will oppose it as strongly as we can. We oppose it on principle. In this Bill, we see the political philosophy of the Minister for Transport and Power in respect of public transport. It must be abundantly clear that the Minister for Transport and Power does not believe in nationalised transport. As far as I can see, he believes in a liberalisation, in a free-for-all, cut-throat competition between the private hauliers. I hope I am not doing the Minister a disservice when I say that I feel one of his chief ambitions must be to see, ultimately, the folding-up of public transport in all its spheres —road passenger, road freight and rail.

What confuses the ordinary Deputy like myself is the effort one has to make to reconcile the apparent attitude of the present holder of the portfolio of Transport and Power with the attitude of the present Taoiseach who guided very enlightened transport legislation through this House. Naturally I do not know what happens at Cabinet meetings but I am entitled to suspect that not alone the Taoiseach but several other members of the Cabinet must be at variance with the ultra-conservative, pre-Victorian policy of the Minister for Transport and Power in relation to these matters.

Mr. Childers

This Bill was agreed on by the Government as a whole, by all the members collectively.

Mr. Casey

As I told the Minister last week, I will not interrupt him when he is replying and I would beg him not to interrupt me while I am making my contribution.

Mr. Barry

The reference to "pre-Victorian" struck the note.

Mr. Casey

It did.

Mr. Childers

On a point of order, in order to guide the debate, if CIE presented a statement that they intend to substitute services for a railway and as they have not closed it, then raising in this debate the question of whether I intend to dismantle CIE is not appropriate. This is merely the substitution of one service for another. Surely at this stage in this narrow Bill we cannot go into matters like that?

Mr. Casey

Surely there is only one Chairman?

Mr. Childers

The appropriate occasion to consider that would be on the Estimate.

Mr. Casey

Surely there is only one Chairman here?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Minister is entitled to put his point of order.

Mr. Casey

And the Chair has ruled against him?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I have not ruled at all yet. I allowed the Deputy to go outside the narrow ambit——

Mr. Casey

Indeed, you have done no such thing.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Would the Deputy please listen to the Chair?

Mr. Casey

I will.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

This, as the Deputy is aware, is an enabling Bill and the Deputy is entitled to debate the Bill in so far as the termination of services on the railway lines of the country and the abandonment of railway lines are concerned, but an overall discussion on CIE would not arise on this Bill.

Mr. Casey

Right; I bow to your ruling, Sir. I take it I may refer to the section which refers to the Waterford-Rosslare line. Again, this baffles me because one Minister gets up at some chamber of commerce meeting and says that he has great plans for Waterford, that it is going to be a growth centre, that it is going to be highly industrialised and that there is to be harbour development there, and while he is saying that, his colleague, the Minister for Transport and Power, is in the process of closing down the railway into the place. We feel that at some stage the various Ministers might come together and correlate their aims and objectives and put a clear picture before the Dáil and the country in this regard.

I do not know, and I do not expect the Minister to inform me, what confidential information he got from CIE before he decided to close the branch line concerned but I will challenge him in this regard. From sources of information available to me, I understand that the commercial section of CIE made a strong recommendation against the closure of this line and that it was the operative section of CIE who made the contrary recommendation which apparently has been accepted by the Minister at the behest of certain people who have vested interests in the particular area, as far as transport is concerned. I could be very much more specific but I think even in my vagueness the penny will drop with the Minister and that he will know what I am talking about.

I hope in his reply to this debate he will clear up, once and for all, whether or not the various sections, the executive sections of CIE, were unanimous in their recommendation to the Minister, or whether there was a hurly-burly amongst them in which the fittest carried the day by a slender majority. The people about whom Deputy Barry speaks, and the people whom Deputy Kyne represents in that constituency, must suffer as a result of this decision by a certain pinhead who happens to be engaged in the service of CIE.

I should also like the Minister to clarify another point. I do not want to make any political capital out of the retirement of the Chairman of CIE, Dr. Andrews. Enough has been said about that. However, I should like to know if it is true that the Chairman of CIE felt it incumbent upon himself to offer his resignation for the reason that he was charged by legislation passed in this House to carry out a certain public transport policy——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I do not see how the Deputy can say that that particular matter——

Mr. Casey

——which the Minister——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy will listen to the Chair. That matter does not arise and the Deputy will not pursue the subject any further. Otherwise, he will resume his seat. It has nothing to do with the Bill.

Mr. Casey

The Title of the Bill is the Transport Bill of 1966.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Yes, but the matter mentioned by the Deputy does not arise. The Minister, if he mentioned it when replying, would also be out of order.

Mr. Casey

At any rate, he has heard me and perhaps he would reply to it. I had been looking forward to seeing a section in the Bill which does not appear in it and I am wondering why it is missing. The Minister will appreciate that it is a matter of urgent public importance in relation to transport matters. I am referring to the recent action of the Minister in allowing lorries to operate from Northern Ireland for reward in the Republic.

Mr. Childers

That does not arise.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That matter does not arise here.

Mr. Casey

I am going to say this. The Minister has made an order giving permission to lorries to operate from the Six Counties into this State.

Mr. Childers

There is nothing about that in the Bill.

Mr. Casey

There is nothing——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Casey may not pursue this line. It is totally irrelevant.

Mr. Casey

I can assure you, Sir——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

There can be no assurance on this point. It has nothing to do with the Bill. The Deputy will get an opportunity of dealing with it on the Estimate.

Mr. Casey

I am sure the Minister would like to reply.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

No; the Chair will not allow the Minister to reply to something that is irrelevant.

Mr. Kyne

Is it not true that this line is being closed for economy reasons, while, at the same time, lorries operating outside the State are being permitted to operate within the State, thereby reducing further the available traffic? Surely the two are related?

Mr. Casey

I think the Minister is acting in contempt. He has no statutory power to allow these lorries in from Northern Ireland.

Mr. Childers

I dealt with that in the Seanad and it does not arise on this Bill; it has nothing to do with this Bill.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Casey is well aware it is not a matter that can be discussed on this Bill.

Mr. Casey

This is the Transport Bill, 1966.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That is so, but that does not open up discussion on every aspect of transport.

Mr. Casey

I appreciate that, but this is something that has been imposed quite recently on the people by the Minister, without the authority of this House, without any statutory authority.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy has covered it sufficiently and he should get away from it now. It is not relevant. The Deputy is completely out of order.

Mr. Casey

I am sorry you should rule in that way because, the Minister having made the decision, I thought he might take the opportunity of the first Transport Bill after that decision to include something to cover himself legislatively for an act that he has committed illegally. If he would be good enough, I should like him to tell us why he is now condoning the haulage of goods in this State by Northern Ireland lorry owners——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I am afraid the Deputy is not paying attention to the Chair. I would ask him to resume his seat.

Mr. Casey

——to the detriment of the national transport system.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I would ask the Deputy to resume his seat.

Mr. Casey

Right, Sir.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I have asked the Deputy to resume his seat. The Deputy is not paying the slightest attention to the Chair.

Mr. Casey

Will you allow me to conclude?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy has concluded. Deputy Kenneally.

Mr. Kenneally

I must admit there is disappointment in my area. While this Bill does not actually close this line, it does give CIE authority to close it if they think fit. I attended the meeting to protest against the decision to close this line. The representative of the Junior Chamber of Commerce expressed the view of the traders in Dungarvan: his members were of opinion that they had more or less to agree with the attitude of CIE because of the small amount of traffic carried on the line. Excluding Waterford and Mallow, only 14 lbs to 16 lbs per day was the average total from all the other stations. While it is appreciated that the line is not economic from a commercial point of view, the feeling is that it should be retained from the social point of view.

I agree with Deputy Barry that economies could be effected. I should like to give an example. There is a crossing-gate just outside the town of Dungarvan. In the cottage at that gate, there was an ex-CIE pensioner and his daughter. He died, and his pension died with him. The daughter was allowed to remain on in the cottage and she was asked to open and close the gates. I approached the local area manager to get some remuneration for her and he informed me that, in no circumstances, could any payment be made to her. That was the legal position. She had to vacate the house in order to find some position elsewhere to enable her to maintain herself. I am told it now costs something in the region of £12 per week to have someone opening and closing these gates. The railwaymen come out from Dungarvan station to open and close them. I am sure this lady would have been satisfied with £2 per week and the house, but CIE could not see their way to permitting this.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

It does not seem to arise.

Mr. Kenneally

If this line is closed redundant staff will either have to be transferred or receive compensation. Now this is one particular aspect of the Bill upon which I should like the Minister to be clear. Workers on this line from Waterford to Mallow will probably lose their employment.

A good deal of capital has been made about the road from Waterford to Mallow. Deputy Barry put a question to the county engineer in Waterford as to the cost and he estimated that it would cost £500,000 to realign the road.

Mr. Barry

That is true.

Mr. Kenneally

This is a large sum but this realignment would have been necessary in any case. Its urgency is accentuated, I admit, because of the increase in heavy traffic. The road from Waterford to Dungarvan is in reasonably good condition. It is a good wide road. A good deal of money has been spent on it. The road from Dungarvan to Mallow is definitely bad. Traffic will be rerouted through Clonmel and the people at the protest meeting were of the opinion that the money spent on the roads could be and should be used to subsidise the line. I do not agree with that. The road would have to be repaired, even if the line were never closed.

Mr. P. Hogan

(South Tipperary): I suppose this Bill would never have come before us, were it not for the fact that it is tied up with cross-Channel interests. The standard argument in relation to the closing down of lines is economy. The Minister says keeping the line open would mean a capital expenditure of £344,000. The line is running at a loss of £50,000 per annum at the moment. He does not elaborate on whether that capital expenditure might not in time cut down the annual loss. Presumably the feeling is that it would not. In view of the fact that many other sections of railway line are running on an insolvent basis, I should like to know why this particular section was picked on at this particular time. Was it the most insolvent section? Are there others more insolvent? If so, why are they being retained and this particular section closed down?

When speaking about the annual loss, the Minister did not advert to the burden which closure will place upon other sources of money. It is obvious that if traffic is diverted from a branch railway, the Department of Local Government and, more important, the local ratepayers, will have to meet an added burden in so far as they will have to provide improved roads. Deputy Barry mentioned a figure of £250,000 as required to put the Mallow-Waterford road into a reasonable state of repair. I know sections of this road. It is, as he describes it, a very difficult, winding road. It will require much improvement as regards bends. Those of us who serve on local bodies know that the most expensive kind of work you can have on local roads is realignment. Apart from the immediate expenditure, there will be increased maintenance costs which the ratepayers of Cork and Waterford will have to meet. Deputy Barry gave the figure of £3,000 per mile. I do not know what the exact mileage of road is between Mallow and Waterford but it is probably 70 or 80 miles. That would amount to a considerable sum, a large proportion of which will fall on the backs of the ratepayers in Waterford and Cork.

The Minister has told us he will provide an alternative but somewhat longer railway route via Limerick Junction and that he will supplement that with four or five single deck buses and seven or eight lorries. He has stated that the average passenger rate is eight or nine per day and that there is one freight train daily. I am not in a position to say whether that auxiliary type of service will adequately compensate for what he is removing, but I have serious misgivings on the point.

I am particularly interested in this from the point of view of West Waterford which is now part of the constituency of South Tipperary. It would seem to me this is going to be a considerable disservice to the people of Lismore, Cappoquin, Tallow, and Kilmacthomas areas, all in West Waterford. In fact, they are being by-passed and cut off from rail communication with the port of Waterford. My second interest in the matter is the question of redundancy and unemployment which inevitably arise when these branch railways are shut down. It is a simple matter to discuss it academically in the Dáil, but it is a very serious matter for the unfortunate man and his family who happen to be so affected, particularly if he is past middle age.

We have been told that Waterford is to be developed as an industrial centre, something on the lines of the Shannon Airport development centre. Waterford is named as a potential industrial growth centre for the future. At present the Port Commissioners in Waterford are trying to raise a large amount of money to modernise the port for container traffic. They have been to various public authorities asking them to act as guarantors and indeed to give them for the first five years interest-free loans in order to develop their port. They have been to South Tipperary, Kilkenny and Wexford trying to tie them up with Waterford Corporation and Waterford County Council so as to develop and improve the facilities in the port, particularly for future container traffic. The shutting down of this branch railway, particularly going through the areas of Lismore, Cappoquin and Tallow, is hard to reconcile with the very worthy effort being made by the Port Commissioners in Waterford to improve the facilities offered in the port. I appreciate the Minister's difficulty from the point of view of a branch railway which is insolvent; but he has many such branches on his hands. I would feel there must be other branches at which he could have cast his pickaxe rather than single out the West Waterford or Mallow-Waterford section.

I was surprised at the statement made by Deputy Casey that there was a conflict of interest between the commercial section of CIE and other sections and that vested interests prevailed. I wish he had elaborated on it. If there is anything to it, he should have done so. It raises queer doubts in the mind of anybody listening. I do not know what significance to attach to it. Every Deputy who speaks on this knows he is beaten before he starts. We know that when the axe was sharpened for any local branch line, it has always fallen. I am not aware of any line being saved by any effort made by public representatives on any side of the House. It would seem inevitable that once the administrative section of our semi-autonomous CIE Board make up their minds they are going to close down a particular section, it comes about. I would ask the Minister to consider this branch line, particularly in connection with the projected improvement and development now being undertaken for Waterford port.

Mr. Kyne

I was particularly struck by the fact that the Minister in his speech paid scant attention to the part British Railways have to play in the introduction of this Bill. He did not indicate whether corresponding legislation has to be passed in the British Parliament; nor did he say that it would not have to be passed or whether the British Parliament had any interest in the matter at all. He did not tell us if any effort had been made by British Railways to induce CIE to shut down the section of the line in which they are mainly interested, that portion from Fermoy to Waterford city and right through to Rosslare. A definite case could be made for this if it was suggested it was done by a British Railway company to save loss. Then the discussion would be of considerable interest and we could ask what return was got out of this line by a British company, a line that was built on guarantees by the citizens of Waterford and neighbouring counties. Is it not because of the altered circumstances of a changing world that a loss is accruing and that they are cutting their losses and getting out? I ask the Minister if that is true?

What significance was there in the Minister's complete ignoring of the fact that British Railways have an interest in this line? I understand that while we can refuse to run trains on the line, we cannot sell a single house on it without the consent of British Railways and that some of our sales of houses which have already taken place are completely illegal. This Bill now legalises what was done by CIE over a number of years. That does not commend itself to anyone who might think that the officers of CIE are a responsible body of men who would make no hasty decisions. Something must have gone wrong somewhere along the line.

This Bill does not close the line— it is an enabling Bill—but we all know in our hearts that it would not be brought in here unless it was in the minds of the responsible officials of CIE that this line is to be cut out. The Minister pointed out in his opening speech that he would see to it that some senior officers of CIE would meet any deputation that would go to them on the matter. There is a deputation already in formation awaiting the passage of this Bill in order to attempt to influence the staff of CIE, whether they be the headquarters men or the area manager. I would prefer it to be the board of directors that they should meet because it is the board of directors who will come to a decision on the matter.

In the case of the closing of the Tramore line, it was the board of directors who made the decision, even though the officials advised them. Getting the area manager in Waterford to meet the local inhabitants is not good enough. They should be entitled to see the people this House puts there. These directors were appointed by this House and they have an obligation to this House, and we should be able to get from them the facts and figures of this closure.

In other cases where railway lines were closed, information was given to me after the closure which, if I had had it before the line was closed, would have placed me in a much better position to argue against the closure. Unfortunately, when you meet these officials in CIE, they have all the facts and figures at their fingers' ends and the ordinary public representative or business man is forbidden to get any information from stationmasters or anybody else. The only facts we can get are those given to us unofficially because stationmasters have been warned not to supply information that would help to build up a case that the line was not losing money.

I know that in the case of the Tramore line, the loss was claimed to be £5,000. Waterford Corporation and Waterford County Council agreed to put up that loss plus certain increases in fares but the line was torn up at one minute past midnight on 1st April, which was the operative date. It was torn up in the middle of the night because they were so anxious to get rid of it. I presume the same will be done when the operative date comes in connection with this line.

I know, and every responsible Deputy knows, that this is a vital matter for the people of Waterford and for the people employed on the line. It is vital for the tourist industry, for our relatives and friends who come home each year and bring their children with them at great inconvenience and expense. They would now be supposed to travel from Waterford to Midleton, or on to Cork city, by bus and without toilet facilities. How could a woman with a baby in arms undertake that type of journey after having travelled from Paddington to Fishguard and then on to Waterford? How could such a woman then get into a bus and travel on to Midleton or perhaps further on?

I do not think this is good enough. The people in my constituency do not think it is good enough. We feel that in this Bill the Minister is doing a disservice to my constituency and to the constituency of South Tipperary. A list of the towns affected was read out by the Minister at the request of Deputy Dillon but a considerable number of people are affected as well as these towns. In Lismore, Tallow and Kilmacthomas, serious efforts are being made to attract industry. There are development associations there which have advertised in German and American papers and they have entertained industrialists from Britain, Germany, France and other countries. One of the first questions they are asked is: "What railway link have you with Waterford port?" From this on we will have to say: "None at all. You will have to travel by road." That is wrong. This industrial estate being set up in Waterford is a good thing. Our town clerks and those who attended a planning conference in the Custom House only a couple of months ago were told there would be offshoots of this industrial estate all over the county and that we would come into the picture. How are we going to come into the picture if we are to be cut off from the cheapest method of travelling? I see this as a deliberate effort to weaken West Waterford.

Perhaps the Minister would be able to answer the question: is the Cork-Youghal line less profitable than the Mallow-Rosslare line? I challenge the Minister to produce proof that our line is less profitable than the Cork-Youghal line. The Cork-Youghal line was to be axed—I am glad it was not—but there were deputations trying to keep it from being closed and the Cork-Youghal line continues. Even though the Minister says he has no function in this regard, the Minister has a function when it becomes a dangerous political situation. I would suggest that the Fianna Fáil Deputies representing South Tipperary and Waterford should assert themselves in somewhat the same manner as the Fianna Fáil Deputies asserted themselves in a neighbouring constituency and county.

I find it very difficult to work out the average the Minister gave of eight passengers per station. It is true that some of our stations are not stations in the sense of being tourist stops; they are really halts to pick up creamery produce, cattle or something like that. If you measure up the stations that really would be effective between Waterford and Fermoy, you would find there are four or five stations that could be considered in the working out of an average daily discharge or intake of passengers; then the average would shoot up from eight per station to something like 30 per station, which is a vastly different figure. Deputy Barry gave some figures in regard to the traffic rate per mile, of which I also have a copy, but it is pointless to repeat them. I challenge the Minister to deny that there are lines in existence in Ireland at the present moment which are costing much more per mile to maintain than the line it is now proposed to close down. If so, why is the Waterford line chosen as the target?

I do not believe that the assessment of seven buses, five lorries and a couple of trailers would take the hundreds and hundreds of tons of beet arriving at Dungarvan station during the beet season. Thousands of tons are sent to Mallow, and that will have to go by road. Deputy Hogan and Deputy Barry gave some figures in respect of the cost of (1) preparing the road for it and (2) maintaining it. In respect of the section of the road in Waterford, our engineer put the cost at £500,000, plus a cost of £10,000 per year for increased maintenance due to the closure of the line. This is hardly economy, when the Minister for Local Government will have to give £500,000 and the ratepayers and taxpayers will have to provide another £10,000 per year for that portion that is in Waterford, plus the figure for South Tipperary and portion of Cork.

Apart from this being false economy, we are depriving the people of West Waterford, South Tipperary and parts of Cork of a social amenity. People who in their thousands used to go by train to football matches will now have to go by road. The GAA people should have an interest in this because when teams like Waterford and Tipperary or Waterford and Cork are playing, the rail service is essential because to travel to Thurles, you have to go down to Waterford, back around by Clonmel and on to Thurles. Furthermore, for the tourist trade and also for the beet trade it is absolutely essential to keep the railway line.

Deputy Barry suggested that some economies could be made. I do not know a great deal about how economies could be made because I have never worked in the railway service, but it seems ridiculous to me that a train should leave Waterford in the morning to go to Dungarvan and a bus should leave within ten or 15 minutes of the train. The roadway runs practically parallel with the railway line, and the bus and the train run the same way at about the same time instead of running in opposite directions to serve the interests of the people. If that is not crazy, I do not know anything at all about commonsense. I remember that in 1926—that is a long time ago—you could leave my town of Dungarvan at 7.45 a.m., get on to a passenger freight train that came from Rosslare, reach Waterford at 9.30 a.m. and then transfer to a train that reached Dublin at 12.5 or 12.10 p.m. Now, 40 years later, you leave at 9.45 a.m. and arrive at Kingsbridge, after travelling twice the round via Mallow, and so on, at 3.15 p.m. That is surely not progress.

Something should be done to make the railway more attractive. A great deal of the falling off, outside of that which is natural because of road traffic changes and more people having cars, could be arrested if people were encouraged to use the railway. I want to join with my colleagues in the Opposition—because I am afraid I cannot say the same for my colleagues on the Government side, although I would be quite sure they agree with me—in deploring the closing of the railway line, and I want to protest emphatically against its closure.

Mr. Davern

I should like to take this opportunity of expressing my thanks publicly to the Minister for Transport and Power for the courtesy which he afforded Members of this House and Members of the Seanad for the area concerned in receiving a deputation in regard to the proposed closure of this line. I know it was not the practice, but, due to the extraordinary circumstances of this case, an exception was made. Certainly the Minister by his very forceful arguments, unfortunately, gave us very little leeway whereby to save the railway line for this important section of my constituency, West Waterford. One argument was that the second lowest rate of goods and passenger traffic obtained on this line. I wonder would the Minister, in some altruistic mood, consider retaining it on that ground? If the line with which it is competing were closed, then it would be the lowest paying line in Europe and might therefore be a tourist attraction.

From the more mundane point of view, the most cogent argument for trying to retain this line is that West Waterford is a depressed area industrially but in recent times mining and drilling operations have taken place and it is not beyond expectation and, indeed, it is the fervent hope of most of us that some great good may result from these operations and we could possibly see an expansion in industry similar to what has taken place in Gortdrum or Tynagh. Should that be the case, then it would be imperative to have a railway line in the immediate vicinity of the mines and certainly traversing that portion of the county.

Those who are familiar with West Waterford know that, while some of the roads are excellent, many roads are narrow or hemmed in by the river on one side and the tremendous cliffs that overhang on the other side. This precludes any real development of roads in the modern concept. Therefore, when the Minister states that five trucks plus trailers will serve adequately the present needs, as possibly they would, that would not be at all sufficient for the potential that is there if the mining operations prove successful. There is no ground to believe that they will not be successful because in Tallow up to 60 years ago mining was carried out as a reality and were it not for the fact that it became uneconomic with the machinery then in operation, might still be carried on there.

The tourist potential of West Waterford has never been fully exploited. There is the Blackwater Valley and the scenic beauty of Lismore which have as yet remained virtually untapped. With the greater drive by Bord Fáilte and organisations such as SKAL, West Waterford will come into its own. The airport at Cork has made it very easy for people to fly from the Continent or Great Britain to Cork and then go by rail to West Waterford and the towns of Tallow, Lismore and Cappoquin.

There are other grounds for the retention of a railway, despite the fact that it may not be paying at present. There are social grounds. The welfare of the employees whose whole life has been built up on the railway system must be considered. They are a class apart. Many of them would be unemployable in any other walk of life. It has been traditional with them to be railway workers and to be employed on the permanent way. There is possibly some merit in every cause and I am sure the farmers whose lands are traversed by the railway line would welcome its closure because a railway line going through any farm is a serious hazard and grave inconvenience but I feel the farmers concerned would forgo and forsake any advantage that might accrue to them personally if the greater good of the vast majority of the community were at stake. It is on that ground that I would ask the Minister to consider the postponement of this Bill or, if that is not possible, to make it implicit that the Board of CIE and British Railways will not close this line for at least five years to give every possible and conceivable opportunity for the development of West Waterford in the industrial or mining spheres.

I appreciate that this Bill is not a Bill to close the line but rather a Bill to give power to CIE and British Railways to do so. If this were a completely cut and dried case of closing the line, it would not have come before the House. CIE have power to do so of their own accord. I travelled to Dungarvan some Saturdays ago and representatives of Cork, Tipperary, Waterford, both east and west, were vehement in their argument that the railway should be retained. Having listened to Deputy Kyne, I can see very good reasons for its retention.

Deputy Hogan referred to the development of Waterford Harbour. At times the devil can quote Scripture for his own purposes. Last Monday Deputy Hogan was not too keen on the further development of Waterford Harbour. If today he thinks differently, I say more power to him.

The Minister has given his blessing to the Waterford Harbour project. The development of Waterford Harbour will expand beyond the normal conception of people here the potential not alone of Waterford city but of all the outlying districts such as Kilkenny, South Tipperary and West Waterford. Its development will become a real factor within the next four or five years. This must of necessity bring a bigger volume of business to the harbour of West Waterford. If the lifeline of the harbour is cut off even to one degree, it will hinder the development of the harbour and much of the money being spent on this development will be somewhat wasted if we cannot avail of every opportunity of furthering the interests not merely of Waterford Harbour in its new form but also of West Waterford.

I appreciate that the Minister is on the horns of a dilemma in this matter. He has been told, on the one hand, that the line does not pay and, on the other, that we wish to have it retained. He, possibly, is not the best person to judge but certainly his advisers would be able to view the position more dispassionately than we can.

If this matter goes to a vote, I may have to vote with the Minister while my heart and sympathy are with the people of West Waterford.

(Interruptions.)

Mr. Treacy

That is cold comfort for the people of West Waterford.

Mr. Davern

I am merely a private in my army and if we do not have discipline, then we will have moved in a way with which I certainly will not be associated. We may legislate with our feet. Our hearts may go the other way. Deputy Tully would be on very thin ice if he were in my constituency.

Mr. James Tully

I will keep out of it so and leave it to Deputy Treacy.

Mr. Davern

I would ask the Minister to view seriously the grave effect the closure of this line will have on many of the people in West Waterford where employment is not too plentiful. If many of the people at present employed on the line are redundant, they will find it more than difficult to find alternative employment. On that ground, the line more than justifies itself. People who have given a lifetime of service, not merely to CIE but to its predecessor, will find themselves thrown on the scrapheap prematurely. I would ask the Minister, if at all possible, to give further assistance, and the benefit of the doubt, in having the line retained for the next five years.

I know that CIE can be very liberal in their promises prior to the closure of any line. In Cashel we had a rather unfortunate experience when a branch line was closed and when a deputation of local business interests and members of the UDC were met graciously by CIE personnel, they were promised that there would be no diminution of service. We found first that the depot they established was withdrawn after a number of years and we were told then that Goolds Cross would no longer be our railhead, that it was moved to Thurles with a daily service from there. This has been withdrawn and we now find we have a three day service coming into operation in Cashel.

That is the type of treatment CIE wish to mete out to those less fortunate than others in being precluded from being on paying lines. Practically no rail service in the world pays but it provides a social service in many fields and one that must be maintained because instead of spending vast sums of money in developing roads where it is possible to develop them—in this particular area it is virtually impossible to improve many of them because you are hindered by rivers and the terrain, —why not maintain the permanent way that already exists and gives fruitful employment to many and would be of immense value for further development and even provide the hope of development for a depressed area?

I again ask the Minister to give every possible benefit of doubt to Waterford and the line between Waterford and Mallow.

Mr. Ryan

Deputy Davern has a perfect way of keeping this line open. He knows how narrow is the Government's majority in the House and he can vote with us on this measure and by so doing, ensure that this line will remain open not only for five years but for many years to come. I am perfectly satisfied that if there was an aggressive advertising programme carried out by CIE they could attract more people to the railways, both as passengers and as people wishing to convey goods by rail. It is apparent that for years CIE have been deliberately avoiding spending money on railways. I have posed this problem to the House and to the Minister and received evasive replies, but we know that in the Dublin region CIE carries next to no advertising whatever to attract people to Dublin suburban railways. In seacoast towns adjacent to Dublin, numerous shop windows have posters advertising the times of CIE buses but there is no notice of this kind in respect of the railways except at the railway station outside the towns. I understand that a similar negative approach operates in the Waterford-Mallow region and I am reasonably satisfied that if CIE carried out an aggressive advertising programme, they could attract to the railway in that region sufficient traffic in passengers and goods to overcome the deficit of £50,000 which the Minister, through the advisory information he has received from CIE, now suggests is the annual loss on this line. I doubt if in the calculation of that figure CIE gave credit for the profit which they earn on the express service from Rosslare and the stations on that line.

We had experience in Dublin of CIE carrying on the same biased accountancy of taking away from a line the overall elements of profitability and pinning on that line only the losses. The kind of statement the Minister produced here today is utterly inadequate and grossly insufficient. I think it is an insult to this House. I do not for a moment accept the selected material we are presented with by the Minister for Transport and Power whenever he tries to justify the cutting down of railway or transport services of any kind. I do not accuse him of telling untruths but I do accuse him of not telling the truth because again and again we have had this selected material presented to us. How can the 144 Members of the House give a sensible, mature and well-considered judgment on this matter when the only figure they get is that there is an average of between eight and nine people boarding or alighting daily at intermediate stations on this line? Apparently we ought to visualise some peculiar human factor of 8½ persons joining the rail service at 14 different stations and on this basis decide that the railway should be closed. It is time the Minister stopped insulting the House and treated it as it deserves. It may well be that these closure proposals should go to a special Committee of the House who would then go into the figures. The Deputies from the Cork, Waterford and Tipperary regions could sit in Committee and be able to send for people who would give the correct facts and figures which they would then be able to test against their own knowledge and experience.

Mr. Childers

The House has invested CIE with power to close the railways.

Mr. Ryan

The Minister is before the House because CIE have not got power to close this line. That is why he is here: he says so in his introductory statement and we know that is the position. We are now being asked as a sovereign Parliament to decide whether or not this line should be closed and whether or not we should give CIE power to close it. We are entitled to count every nut and bolt on the Waterford-Mallow line and consider everything and keep this House going for months while we do it and there is nothing the Minister could do about it. We have not deputed CIE to close this line and that is why the Minister is here today.

Deputy Barry expressed the view that long-distance travel by bus is not the best form of travelling and the Minister accused him of being Victorian. Recently I had what was probably an unusual experience for a member of this House, the experience of travelling for five hours in a CIE bus. I would not wish the journey on my worst enemy but it was an enlightening experience. So far as the bus was concerned, its movement and vibrations were sufferable, but what was quite insufferable was that the passengers were expected to sit for five hours as if they were in the stocks. There were far too many seats, 43 seats, and never more than 13 passengers who had to endure the journey in most uncomfortable positions with insufficient leg room and incorrectly designed seats. My own experience was that when I awoke on the following day I had aches and pains which did not leave my back for some days afterwards. If that is what the Minister regards as the success of travel by bus in 2000 A.D. the sooner we go back to Victorian days of horse-drawn transport the better. At least people were not so cramped then.

To suggest, as the Minister does, that this is an alternative way to travel the journey is quite ludicrous. Very many people are physically unable to endure the suffering I was called upon to endure on that journey. It is not good enough for CIE to provide that kind of service and regard it as an adequate substitute. As Deputy Barry also mentioned, no toilet facilities are provided for travellers by bus. On the particular journey I undertook, there was a break half-way through. A selection of toilet facilities was offered by CIE. One set of these, which was clearly indicated with a sign, was locked. The other set was available, provided one was prepared to queue in a queue of persons of different sexes, directly in off the small waiting-room in a bus station. That is grossly insufficient. If the Minister is asking this House and the country in general to abolish rail services and to accept long-distance bus services in substitution, it is imperative that CIE pay the capital cost of providing proper toilet and other facilities along the route. If they are unable to provide them in the conveyance itself, then they ought to be provided along the route, and until such time as they are prepared to undertake that responsibility, they should be refused power to close any more railways, be they in Waterford, Cork or Tipperary.

It is regrettable that the Minister, although he seeks additional power to close down railways, makes no attempt to show the social cost of removing the railway amenities from the community. This skill of measuring the social cost has been advanced greatly in recent years and there are very many people who can show how, apart from the direct financial book-keeping of an undertaking, other matters can be affected. I should like to think that the Minister would look to these factors. It may be that, on the Board of CIE, there is a specific obligation to keep within certain financial bounds but the community and the Members of this House are justified in seeing to it that they will look not merely to the balance sheet of a particular stretch of railway line but to the social cost of removing the rail services.

A number of Deputies—Deputies Barry, Deputy P. Hogan and others— have mentioned the tremendous inconvenience which will be imposed on families wishing to use this line to travel home for annual holidays from Britain. The Minister is also supposed to be concerned with tourism. From my actual experience of families living in Dublin whose relations are living down the country, I know that some of these families used to travel by rail for annual holidays to their home farm when the railways existed. Since the rails have been ripped up in different parts of the country, the parents are unable to visit their homes annually because of the fatigue involved in bringing their families by a series of different transport conveyances. Also, the delays involved in travelling partly by rail and partly by bus are such as to make it extremely awkward for people to travel as they did heretofore. I am talking of my experience and knowledge of people from the country who are living in Dublin. I have no doubt that other people resident in Dublin are put off from travelling home to the country because of the ripping-up of railways, while people in Britain, be they Irish coming home on holiday or English families thinking of coming over here, will be discouraged by the ripping-up of railways in the manner proposed in this Bill.

I was surprised to hear Deputy Davern's speech. He mentioned that the Minister was on the horns of a dilemma. I do not think the Minister is sitting on as sore a spot as the Deputy himself. I thought it desirable that some person, not directly affected by the particular constituency and its needs, should speak and make his contribution to this debate. It is important that this House discharge its national obligations without regard to locality and inconvenience. We have a duty to be concerned about Bills, even though they do not affect our own particular bailiwick. If a Bill is disadvantageous to the people who elect this House, if our constituents are inconvenienced or opposed to a particular measure, we have a clear moral obligation not alone to speak out the views of those people —as Deputy Davern, I must say, very ably did—but also to vote in accordance with the wishes of the people.

Deputy Davern has clearly indicated that, if he votes in this division, he will vote against the interests of his people. I find that extremely difficult to justify—and what a poor pass we have come to if, in this House, we have a young Deputy of the calibre of Deputy Davern saying that loyalty to the Fianna Fáil Party, and the discipline of the Fianna Fáil Party, is of far greater importance to him than is the discharge of his duty to his constituents: that is what it amounts to. I am appalled to sit in this Parliament and to hear any member of this sovereign democratic Republic give voice to opinions of that kind. One could perhaps respect him if he were to abstain but even that would not be a correct discharge of his duties having regard to the vehement way in which he expressed the opposition of his people to this measure. It is not correct to say that Party discipline comes before the national interest or the interest of his constituency. On that account, I would hope that Deputy Davern would have second thoughts, or that the Minister would release this man from the obligation of committing a parliamentary sin, by making this an open vote.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I did not intend to speak in this debate but I am always inspired by Deputy Ryan who has a habit of not being a bit factual. He has adopted his usual procedure of being opposite to everybody else. No railway line in this country is closed if the people use it: is that not the position?

Mr. Barry

If they toe the line.

Mr. P.J. Burke

Deputy Ryan spoke about many things and I disagree totally with everything he said here this evening.

Mr. Ryan

Thanks be to God: I feel happy to hear that.

Mr. P.J. Burke

Deputy Ryan spoke about Deputy Davern and his loyalty to his Party. Deputy Ryan's loyalty to his Party is the same as that of Deputy Davern to the Fianna Fáil Party. Deputy Ryan has never voted against Fine Gael.

Mr. Ryan

Look up the records.

Mr. P.J. Burke

Deputy Davern is a young man. He said he is compelled to do a certain thing. He made his point as strongly as possible. If he did say something out of context, there is no use in making political capital out of it.

Mr. Ryan

He did not. He deliberately said it and he said it very well.

Mr. P.J. Burke

Deputy Ryan is a very good fellow and can be very charitable by times. This evening I listened to him in the hope that he would be constructive but he was completely destructive, without making any sense, good, bad or indifferent.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): A mighty contribution.

Mr. Treacy

As a Deputy for the constituency of South Tipperary which includes west Waterford and takes into account quite a large number of people who are directly involved in the closure of this line—the Waterford-Mallow line—I feel I have a bounden obligation and public duty to speak on this issue and to express, in so far as I can, the consensus of opinion of the people in this area and to express, moreover, the dismay, disappointment and widespread regret of the people in my constituency who are directly involved at the possible closure of this railway line.

It is to be deplored that the Minister and CIE continue on their rampage and with their wrecking policy in regard to the railway system and with the tearing up of hundreds of miles of line. In this Bill they are adding a further 76 miles of line, despite all the vehement opposition in this House, and the expressions of opposition from members of the Government Party, that this is an anti-social policy which should be discontinued. That expression has been echoed this evening by Deputy Davern who had the courage— if not the political astuteness—to stand up and display some semblance of independence until he came to the stage where he said that in the heel of the hunt, he would have to vote for the Party line.

At a time when there is a dire need to render our roads safer, to eliminate death from them, it is to be deplored that we have a Minister for Transport and Power who condones the irresponsible attitude of "the CIE", as he calls them, in carrying on this anti-social policy. We have eyesores all over the country in the form of stretches of country where hundreds of miles of line were torn up, wrecked bridges and the once busy passage-ways of traffic, trade and commerce now overgrown with weeds. Is it not within the ingenuity of the planners and technicians of CIE to utilise these once essential arteries again to divert traffic from our roads which have become so hazardous, to say the least?

The Minister referred to remarks he made on the Second Reading of the Transport Bill, 1964 when he said that he indicated that the Government had decided after full consideration to preserve the railway system, subject to such further concentration and re-organisation as might prove practicable and desirable. The essential point in that statement is that the Government decided after full consideration of the outbursts of indignation inside and outside this House to preserve the railway system and that this wrecking should be discontinued, but the Minister for his own convenience and in order to enable him to close the Waterford-Mallow railway line added the words "subject to further concentration and re-organisation that might prove practicable and desirable." The Minister is alone in the opinion he expresses that a railway system does not confer any status whatsoever on a community.

Mr. Barry

He is the only one who accepts that.

Mr. Treacy

He is alone in that opinion. A railway system is vital to a local community. We are not concerned about the profit or loss of railways as such; we regard them as a great social need and a social service, as they are recognised in every country, and while one strives to make them profitable, it is a matter of indifference whether or not there are losses. Invariably there are losses in most countries but they are maintained as an essential service for the people.

The Minister talks about CIE being forced to live within their allowance of £2 million. I hope they will but I doubt it very much. The saving he hopes to effect for CIE here is a paltry £50,000. That is the amount which will be saved by the closure of the 76 miles of line between Mallow and Waterford. We have seen the results of closures in the past. We know the reactions of our people to the closing of railway lines in the past. I want to disabuse the Minister of any ideas he may have that people are satisfied afterwards with the type of transport service he provided by way of road services.

I have in mind primarily the tearing up of the Waterford-Tramore line. This was a bad day's work for CIE, a clear indictment of a stupid and foolhardy policy. Before the ink was dry on the Bill which sanctioned that closure, the Minister had his wreckers in Waterford and Tramore knocking down the bridges and tearing up the lines. At the time he promised the people the moon. He promised them a full and adequate road service. The fact is that there are no adequate means by which families in Waterford city can get to Tramore. The buses are not catering for them in the same way as the trains did, particularly for parents with young families.

Promises were made that the buses would pick up the people at certain recognised points but that promise has been departed from and people are being directed to one central point and herded there like animals until such time as a sufficient number of buses come along and take them to Tramore. Nothing could adequately substitute for the train services between Waterford and Tramore. It saddens one to see the once lovely station houses closed and falling into decay, an eye-sore, a monument to the ignorance and stupidity of CIE and the Minister who condoned their action. It saddens one to see the once well-kept railway lines and bridges disappearing. The tracks are now a virtual wilderness. The road—some seven miles long— between Waterford and Tramore is now a death trap; it is a most hazardous road to travel.

Mr. Childers

There is nothing about that in this Bill.

Mr. Treacy

The additional traffic diverted from the railway to the road has greatly increased danger to life for those who travel this road. There have been many accidents. There have been fatalities, all because of this stupid policy of closing railway lines. This House has passed planning legislation. If we are concerned about planning for the future, is it not time that some of our planners had a talk with CIE and asked them to cease forthwith the folly of wrecking our railway system? Can CIE not see any useful purpose to be served in the future by these traffic arteries? In Britain it is no longer the policy to close down railway lines. Certain Ministers in the Labour Government have set their faces against this policy. People who live along these railway lines suffer inconvenience and a certain dislocation when these lines are closed. In the section with which I am concerned, there are no fewer than 14 stations and some of those stations serve important towns such as Lismore, Tallow and Cappoquin in my constituency of South Tipperary.

Dismay, anxiety, unrest and bewilderment have been created by the proposed closure. The Minister has shut his mind to all pleas for sympathy and understanding for these local communities. He has adopted a dictatorial attitude; he alone knows what is best for our local communities; the railway does not confer any benefit on them; it does not confer any status. He is on record in his speech today as saying these things. What the Minister is offering as a substitute for the railway system is wholly unsatisfactory. There is no comparison between an adequate train service and a bus service. I do not want to labour these points. I do not want to take up the time of the House pointing out the disparities between the two but I should like to remind the Minister that a bus service is lacking in very many amenities.

In cold weather, and we have a good deal of cold weather during almost nine months of the year, there is no heating. One is famished travelling by bus. There does not seem to be any recognised timetable. Buses stop anywhere and everywhere. There are no adequate toilet facilities. People are obliged to avail of the village pub; men, women and children must find their way to some primitive toilet in the back. Many buses give the impression that they are on a world tour. The railway line between Clonmel and Thurles was closed and people now know to their sorrow how very inadequate the substitute bus service is. It is slow, tedious and cumbersome. It is most unsatisfactory. Yet, the Minister had the audacity to imply in his speech here today that people are satisfied with the alternative services provided where railway lines have been dismantled.

This is an enabling Bill but the clear intention of the Bill is to close this particular railway line. The Minister has offered those interested a deputation to CIE. He says he has requested the Chairman to arrange with the area manager or some executive officer at headquarters to receive one representative deputation in order that the board may hear the case for the retention of the line. I suppose we should be grateful to the Minister that he should condescend to permit representatives of CIE to meet a deputation, but ought he not to be good enough to tell the House and the country that the deputation is, in fact, being sent on a fool's errand? It will be a waste of time, energy and effort to go before these gentlemen of CIE faced with a virtual fait accompli once this Bill has passed. When we did go before CIE in relation to the closure of a line on an earlier occasion, we found ourselves in the invidious position of being told by these gentlemen that we could not discuss the closure as such, that we could only propose alternative transport methods. That is the autocratic attitude of CIE. They will not deign to discuss with us our views as to why the line should be retained. We are forced into the position in which we must accept the fact that the line is closed and all we may do is discuss alternatives lacking in very many amenities.

I echo the sentiments expressed by Deputy Kyne when he said that CIE are a State body set up by the Oireachtas and as such answerable to us. They are a public enterprise, maintained by public money. They should be responsible to this House. Most of all the views of the public—the closing of this line is essentially a public matter —should be heard by CIE with respect and acted upon. That is the consensus of opinion in this House this evening from the Labour benches, from the Fine Gael benches and indeed from the Fianna Fáil benches. The Minister has no mandate whatever for the policy of wrecking he continues to inflict on so many towns and villages. This is the idea of some so-called genius in CIE as a means of effecting economy. It might be economically wise to tear up hundreds of miles of lines, but is it socially desirable? Is it desirable, in order to save £50,000, to deprive the people living between Mallow and Waterford of this amenity they have enjoyed for so long? We do not believe the Minister and CIE are justified in this attitude in order to save £50,000.

We can only hope that wiser counsels will prevail and that the Minister will have regard to the sentiments he expressed some years ago when he said:

I indicated that the Government had decided after very full consideration to preserve the railway system.

It is to be deplored that the Minister has, once again, departed from this principle. The matter has gone too far. Despite the hundreds of miles of railway torn up, CIE to-day are no better off financially. Indeed, a few months ago when the workers made a demand on them, the Minister and the directors of CIE indicated to the nation that they were virtually bust. They had reached a new financial low. There were rumours about the possibility of certain CIE transport services being sold out to private enterprise.

This policy has done nothing to improve the state of our economy or bolster up the shaky reserves of CIE. While the Minister may maintain that CIE are obliged to live within their allocation of £2 million, we shall not be surprised if he comes back to the House in a few months' time looking for additional financial accommodation. I feel sure this House will not begrudge that money——

Mr. Childers

Oh!

Mr. Treacy

——especially for such an essential service and for a public board such as CIE. We in the Labour benches regard it as a nationalised industry providing an essential service subject to the voice of the people as expressed through this Parliament.

I speak here as a Deputy for the constituency of South Tipperary and West Waterford. The latter part of the constituency contains towns such as Cappoquin, Tallow and Lismore which are directly affected by this measure. I want to express the sadness and regret of the people of this area that this proposal has come so far. I will certainly be a member of any deputation which may go before CIE in order to put forward the most compelling case we can for the retention of this line. But I want to be satisfied I am going there with a chance of success and that the passing of this Bill has not damned our case and made our task impossible because we will be presented with a fait accompli.

If the Minister is to listen to the voice of the Deputies who have spoken, including Deputy Davern of the Government Party, he should in all sincerity convey the views of Deputies to CIE. He should convey the views of those of us who should, if we do not, control these State bodies. He should say to them that Deputies of all Parties have set their faces against the closure of any more railways and that the Mallow-Waterford line must not be interfered with. I was rather pleased to see Deputy Davern rise courageously and display a sense of independence for a while in the case he made for the retention of this line. I felt my task was made far simpler and that I would only have to say that I joined with him in all he said and the case he made against this proposal.

However, Deputy Davern stopped short in two important instances. We differ from him on two points. The first is his appeal to the Minister to defer the closure of the line for five years. This, of course, is to accept the principle of the closure and give the people concerned a slow death of five years waiting. We could never accept that. This line should not be interfered with and CIE and the Minister should take their hands off it right away. It should be maintained for the future. CIE should be obliged to assist, stimulate and co-ordinate the efforts of all concerned in order to make this 76 miles of railway viable and profitable. We believe it could be made more profitable, but there was evidence from certain Deputies here this evening that when CIE decide to close a line, they deliberately and of set policy run down that line economically. In fact they create additional unnecessary expense attached to the operation of that line in order that the Minister may seek to justify himself in the case he brings to this House.

That is something to which the Minister might reply, the allegation that CIE deliberately create a situation whereby a line is placed in a worse economic position than it actually need be in and that additional unnecessary expenditure is incurred in the way of painting premises, even though it is known to CIE that this particular section of line is for the axe. The House must be suspicious of the case made by the Minister and by CIE when all concerned on the lines proposed to be abandoned are specifically instructed not to co-operate with public representatives and not to give any information to interested parties, chambers of commerce, trades councils, farmers' groups, local and public representatives or even to Members of this House.

These people are not to get any information from station-masters or anybody else which would assist them to come to a conclusion as to whether the line is profitable or as to how the alleged losses are arrived at. This is not good enough. That is showing a flagrant disregard for public representatives and for Members of this House.

I will, please God, be a member of the deputation which meets the CIE representatives on this matter and if we do, we want to meet them in a cordial, respectful and co-operative way, at a conference at which there is some hope of our views being heard and at which we will not be presented with a fait accompli. The Minister should ensure, in arranging conferences of this kind, that it is not a junior officer of CIE who is sent to meet the public representatives but somebody who can affect the policy of CIE. Deputations are entitled to meet the Chairman of CIE if they so desire on a matter of such great public importance. This is a matter of great public importance for the people of the towns and villages between Mallow and Waterford.

I will not detain the House further except to express the view again from these benches that we deplore the continual national vandalism being committed by CIE in respect of the wrecking of our railway system which is bringing in no national, economic or social results. We had hoped this was stopped, particularly following the statement of this Minister in 1964 when he spoke on the Transport Bill of that time and said that the Government had decided after full consideration to preserve the railway system.

This has come as a shock and a great disappointment to all of us in this House and to the people directly concerned. My own personal anxiety about the wrecking of our railway system is that it is being done at a time when every conscientious person should be utilising all the ingenuity at his command to divert traffic from our roads, that traffic which is causing such havoc and injury. Is it not the height of folly that we should now be cutting off these important traffic arteries and throwing that traffic on to the roads so that the death toll on the roads is being accelerated out of all proportion by the Minister and by CIE. The Minister has a great moral responsibility in this regard.

Mr. Childers

Having regard to the programme before the House, I do not propose to repeat everything said by myself in regard to CIE policy on railways in relation to the course of the past five years which applies to the case of the Mallow-Waterford line. Deputies can find all the references in the Official Reports and there is no need for me to engage in repetition. People in every country become sentimental when a railway line closes down. That is quite natural and there is very little objective thinking about it. There is nothing very exceptional in the proposals contained in this Bill, as thousands of miles of railway line are being closed down all over Europe by left-wing authorities who have had regard to all the social considerations.

They are being closed after examination in which all the most modern techniques are being used to see if they would become an economic or social success even in 20 or 30 years from now. There have been modifications of policy in various countries. In Britain, Mrs. Barbara Castle, the new Minister for Transport there, has modified the decisions of her predecessor but only in areas where it is believed that the railways might become profitable in conditions of much higher density of population. However, I am talking about railway lines in the character of that under consideration in this Bill in which, so far as we can foresee, none of these matters arise.

I want to refer to one or two items of a particular character relating to the particular line under consideration in the Bill. The closure of this line has no connection with British Railways. It will not be done as a result of any representations from British Railways, nor will British Railways save any money as a result. The administration of this line is entirely under the aegis of CIE.

I do not know the source of Deputy Barry's figures of a loss of £21,000 per annum. I have indicated that the loss is £50,000 per annum and that a capital expenditure of £344,000 for the purpose of new diesel engines will not be required if CIE decide to close the line. A very large amount of capital is involved in this question as well as the annual loss on the line.

One Deputy asked when the figures were prepared by CIE. They were prepared three years ago, and the position has not improved since that time so as to justify any change in the general view of CIE which will be presented to the deputation that comes before CIE after the passing of the Bill. I should say CIE do not allow a line to run down deliberately before closing it. I have no evidence of that whatever. The area managers and the sales staff do their best to sell the general services of CIE, both road and rail.

A number of Deputies omitted to consider the fact that in this Bill we are concerned with a railway line that is paralleled by another railway line. I think this is the first occasion when this matter is being discussed in this context and, as I have said already, if CIE decide to close the line, the majority of the traffic will be carried on the Waterford-Clonmel-Limerick Junction line to Cork and to Limerick.

Station masters are forbidden to give information on the traffic that is being carried over the line for the reason, among other reasons, that simply giving the gross value of traffic carried on the lines is no indication as to its profitability. If Deputies will read the Pacemaker Report, they will see how the computation is made and they will see that mere figures of gross revenue or gross receipts at a particular station have nothing whatever to do with the profitability of the line, because there are so many other factors that have to be taken into account at the same time.

The usual views were expressed on the possible damage to the roads through the closing of the railways. I can hardly believe that any section of any road adjoining the railway would not require improvement, in any event, during the next 20 years arising from the huge increase in private car traffic and lorry traffic all through the country. I have already given statistics about that in connection with the closing of other railway lines, and I do not think there is any need for me to repeat them here, except to point out the enormous increase in the number of lorries in the area of the Waterford-Mallow line in the past ten years and the effect they must have on the road. I do not think the addition of 16 lorries and buses could affect traffic along some particular stretch of road to such an extent as to present the local authorities concerned with a financial crisis.

I want to dispose of all the rumours that there was a tremendous argument within the Board as to whether this Bill should be introduced. I heard of no conflict whatever. These matters are very carefully examined but, of course, a great many rumours circulate around every State company, and indeed, every large institution.

Deputy Davern referred to the possible opening of some coal mine. I would be willing almost to enter into a wager with Deputy Davern that if the mine did open and it was not directly on a railway line, it would be more than likely traffic would have to be brought direct, unless it was worthwhile to build a branch line to the mine.

Other Deputies spoke of the growth of Waterford as a regional centre for industry. I do not believe that the closing of this line and the substitution of bus and lorry services will alter the importance of Waterford city as a regional city for industry. On these occasions people speak as if there was to be no substitute service. I want to be quite frank about this and say that there are some individual complaints when a substitute service operates and a railway closes. Not everybody can be pleased, but I can say with absolute sincerity that in my office there are very few records of complaints in connection with the closing of railway lines. In a great many sectors, the traffic has actually increased because the substitute service means there are more points for taking up and setting down passengers, for taking delivery of goods and for enabling a great many other people to take part in the public transport service. The traffic has increased and, taking it large and wide, I have had very little complaint in regard to the substitute services.

As I have said, CIE will listen to what the deputation has to say to them if they decide to close the line. Therefore, everything that has been said here on this occasion can be repeated before CIE by Deputies and by representatives of the public authority. This is only an enabling Bill, enabling CIE to make the decision that they have already made in other cases one way or another under the 1958 Act, and I confidently recommend it to the House.

Question put.

The Dáil divided: Tá, 64; Níl 44.

Tá

• Aiken, Frank.
• Allen, Lorcan.
• Andrews, David.
• Blaney, Neil T.
• Boland, Kevin.
• Boylan, Terence.
• Brady, Philip.
• Brennan, Joseph.
• Brennan, Paudge.
• Breslin, Cormac.
• Briscoe, Ben.
• Burke, Patrick J.
• Calleary, Phelim A.
• Carter, Frank.
• Carty, Michael.
• Childers, Erskine.
• Clohessy, Patrick.
• Colley, George.
• Collins, James J.
• Corry, Martin J.
• Cotter, Edward.
• Crinion, Brendan.
• Cronin, Jerry.
• Crowley, Flor.
• Crowley, Honor M.
• Davern, Don.
• de Valera, Vivion.
• Dowling, Joe.
• Egan, Nicholas.
• Moran, Michael.
• Nolan, Thomas.
• Ó Briain, Donnchadh.
• Ó Ceallaigh, Seán.
• Fanning, John.
• Faulkner, Pádraig.
• Fitzpatrick, Thomas J.
• (Dublin).
• Flanagan, Seán.
• Foley, Desmond.
• Gallagher, James.
• Geoghegan, John.
• Gibbons, James M.
• Gilbride, Eugene.
• Gogan, Richard P.
• Healy, Augustine A.
• Hillery, Patrick J.
• Hilliard, Michael.
• Kenneally, William.
• Kennedy, James J.
• Lalor, Patrick J.
• Lemass, Noel T.
• Lemass, Seán.
• Lenihan, Brian.
• Lenihan, Patrick.
• Lynch, Celia.
• Lynch, Jack.
• McEllistrim, Thomas.
• Meaney, Tom.
• Millar, Anthony G.
• Molloy, Robert.
• Mooney, Patrick.
• Moore, Seán.
• O'Connor, Timothy.
• O'Malley, Donogh.
• Smith, Patrick.

Níl

• Barry, Richard.
• Belton, Luke.
• Belton, Paddy.
• Burke, Joan T.
• Byrne, Patrick.
• Casey, Seán.
• Clinton, Mark A.
• Cluskey, Frank.
• Connor, Patrick.
• Corish, Brendan.
• Cosgrave, Liam.
• Creed, Donal.
• Crotty, Patrick J.
• Desmond, Eileen.
• Dillon, James M.
• Dockrell, Maurice E.
• Donegan, Patrick S.
• Dunne, Seán.
• Dunne, Thomas.
• Esmonde, Sir Anythony C.
• Farrelly, Denis.
• Fitzpatrick, Thomas J. (Cavan).
• Flanagan, Oliver J.
• Harte, Patrick D.
• Hogan, Patrick (South Tipperary).
• Hogan O'Higgins, Brigid.
• Kenny, Henry.
• Kyne, Thomas A.
• L'Estrange, Gerald.
• Lyons, Michael D.
• McLaughlin, Joseph.
• Murphy, William.
• O'Donnell, Patrick.
• O'Donnell, Tom.
• O'Hara, Thomas.
• O'Higgins, Michael J.
• O'Higgins, Thomas F.K.
• O'Leary, Michael.
• Reynolds, Patrick J.
• Ryan, Richie.
• Sweetman, Gerard.
• Tierney, Patrick.
• Treacy, Seán.
• Tully, James.

Tellers: Tá, Deputies Carty and Geoghegan; Níl, Deputies L'Estrange and James Tully.

Question declared carried.

Agreed to take remaining Stages today.

Bill considered in Committee.

Sections 1 and 2 agreed to.

SECTION 3.

Minister for Transport and Power (Mr. Childers)

I move amendment No. 1:

In page 2, lines 22 to 26, to delete subsection (2) and to substitute the following subsections:

"( ) The said section 21 shall, in its application to a railway line of the Company over which all train services have been terminated by the Board, be construed and have effect as if—

(a) the following paragraph were substituted for paragraph (a) of subsection (2), that is to say:

‘(a) Where the Board has terminated all train services run over a specified railway line of the Fishguard and Rosslare Railways and Harbours Company that Company may, subject to this subsection, by order (in this section referred to as an abandonment order) declare its intention of abandoning that railway line.', and

(b) the references in subsections (2) (b) to (d), (3), (4), (5), and (7) to the Board were references to the Company.

( ) Where, by virtue of the said section 21, as amended by this section, or section 7 of the Transport Act, 1955, a liability of the Company in relation to the maintenance of any works ceases, any corresponding liability of the Board shall also cease."

The amendment is purely of a drafting character. The draftsman said that subsection (2) should be redrafted and this has exactly the same effect. It enables the Fishguard Company to abandon the railway line, if and when the services are terminated by CIE. It takes away any impediment that might remain as a result of the Fishguard services having been operated according to an old British Act up to now.

Mr. Kyne

I take it that my amendment may be discussed at this stage? I should like to move it now.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy may not move it now but may discuss it.

Mr. Kyne

We can have a separate vote on it?

An Ceann Comhairle

That is another matter.

Mr. Kyne

This is a clear indication of the haste with which this Bill was pushed forward. Only a week or two ago, we had the Bill as printed on the green form. Within a couple of hours, CIE found that in their haste to introduce this legislation, they produced something that would not have stood up in a court of law. There is quite a definite chance of this legislation being challenged in the courts. It will not slip by in the normal way and apparently the law advisers in this House, in CIE or elsewhere advised the Minister that faulty legislation has been introduced, apparently because of the hurry of CIE to close this railway.

I listened to the Minister in his concluding remarks on the Second Stage and he denied that there was any pressure from British Railways. He denied there was any question of loss being sustained by them but he did say that CIE had the sole administration of the railway line. That is not to say that if there is a loss, the joint owner does not have to pay part of it. If there was a profit to share, would the British Railways not consider they were entitled to a percentage of it?

Mr. Childers

It does not derive any profit.

Mr. Kyne

I know that. If there is a loss, there cannot be a profit. But some comments the Minister made require clarification. He said the figures were prepared three years ago on which he is now basing his proposal. Could I ask the Minister, through the Chair, whether last year and this year a special account was being taken of passenger and goods traffic on this line? Is it not true that no attempt will be made to close the line until some time next March so that a complete survey may be taken? If that is so, and if such a detailed examination was conducted by CIE, why is the Minister not able to give more up-to-date figures? He gave us figures of three years ago and he did elaborate by saying that he had no reason to think they had improved since. Has he any reason to know whether they have or not? It is just a simple statement of his opinion. I suggest when a big number of railway workers, a big number of businesses and a huge number of people are concerned, it is not good enough to say that he has no reason to think any change has occurred since then.

The Minister denies there is any attempt to run down a line if it is decided by the executive of CIE to close it. Could I remind the Minister that a big military movement took place once in Waterford when they got two diesels to travel along the Quay across Waterford city to the old Tramore railway station? There was no reason why the old steam engines which would normally hold together for ten or 20 years, should be replaced by diesels but CIE had to show a loss. They took off the steam engines which were quite easily able to run the seven or eight miles between Waterford and Tramore and they had this big manoeuvre to bring the diesels over to the Waterford section of the Tramore railway, making quite a military expedition. Surely that must have cost money? These two diesels were brought over absolutely unnecessarily but it was very useful to be able to quote them against that line if you wanted to shut it down two years later. Either it was ignorance to bring the diesels there, knowing that the line would close or the diesels were brought there in ignorance of the fact that it would be closed. Surely there was something wrong? That is why I am opposing this Bill. That is why I am opposing the Minister's amendment. That is why I shall have to demand and look for a vote on each section on which I am permitted to do so because I feel I am speaking on behalf of the people I am sent here to represent.

Mr. Barry

Like Deputy Kyne, I feel constrained to get up again to talk in a very brief way with regard to this issue which I have already told the House I regard as of primary importance not only to myself but to a great many people I represent in my constituency and indeed far outside its confines. Speaking earlier this evening, I mentioned figures that I think the Minister accepted as being out of date. That is all right but the figures the Minister has given us are, I believe, figures of three years standing.

I did say, when I was speaking, that I should like the Minister to examine the figures with regard to the freight and passenger traffic of Fermoy station over the past year or two. Until such time as I get these figures from him, or from some responsible authority in CIE, I am not prepared to accept in any circumstances any proposal to close the Mallow-Waterford line. There are many other reasons, as I already indicated, which would annoy me if there were even a mention of the closing of it. I think I am most reasonable when I say that when the Minister produces the figures in respect of the Fermoy station over the past 1½ or two years, whichever is the more convenient to him, and reads them out in this House, then I shall stand corrected if what I have already said is not true or near the truth.

Mr. Casey

In my Second Reading speech on this Bill, I posed some questions to the Minister to which I hoped he would reply. He has paid me the discourtesy of disregarding any remarks I made in my Second Reading speech. I am not particularly upset personally about that but this is Committee Stage and, in discussing the amendment proposed by Deputy Kyne, I shall have to pose further questions. The Minister will possibly disregard them again. He will steamroll the legislation through the House.

The fact of the matter is that the history of this Minister for Transport and Power has been that of a man who appears determined to close down the railway system, and not alone to close down the railway system but to dismantle and disintegrate the whole concept of nationalised transport—rail, road freight and road passenger. I shall ask the Minister the question again which I put to him in my Second Reading speech and to which he failed to refer—inadvertently, I am sure, but I should like to remind him of it again. What advice did he get regarding the closing of the railway line between Mallow and Rosslare? Is it not a fact that a very substantial, influential and intelligent section of CIE advised the Minister strongly against the closure?

Mr. Childers

I answered that.

Mr. Casey

I did not interrupt the Minister and I hope the Minister will not interrupt me. I ask this question again to which the Minister failed to reply when I asked him to do so when making my Second Reading speech. Is it not a fact that a substantial section of the CIE organisation, including the Chairman who has now retired, advised against closure? Perhaps one of the reasons the Chairman retired was that he was bound by legislation to carry out the dictates of this House to provide a reasonable, co-ordinated public service transport organisation but found that the policy of the Minister, the exercise of the Minister, the operation of the Minister, was completely contrary to the dictates of this House as passed in legislation largely advocated and carried by the present Taoiseach in his enlightened approach to public transport.

The only reason, of course, the Minister has had to put this section in the Bill is that a similar Bill must be passed in the British House of Commons. He had no such difficulty when he decided to close the West Cork railways and when he decided to close the Waterford-Tramore line. But, in this instance, because of old legislation, there is an arrangement between himself and his counterpart in the British Parliament to pass similar legislation.

Mr. Childers

No. No Bill has to be passed in the House of Commons. It is absurd; it is not true.

Mr. Casey

I am suggesting this. The Minister can reply if he wishes. It is an arrangement arrived at between our Minister for Transport and Power and the appropriate Minister in Britain. Therefore, this Minister has to go through this drill on this occasion which he refused to go through when he closed the West Cork railway and the Waterford-Tramore railway. He has the humiliating experience of having to come to this House and endeavour to explain to us why he now wishes to close the line between Mallow and Rosslare.

Mr. Childers

Waterford.

Mr. Casey

Waterford. As I said, I invited the Minister's comments and, inadvertently, I am sure, he refused to comment on them in his reply to the debate on Second Reading. As an ordinary Deputy, I should like to know why one Minister tells us, on the one hand, that Waterford is a city of growth, that the port of Waterford is being developed at tremendous State expense, while, on the other hand, the Minister for Transport and Power is deciding to close down the main line of communication between the centre of Munster and the city and port of Waterford. This House is entitled to an explanation and we should like to know if there have been discussions between the Ministers on these matters, if there have been differences of opinion and if the Minister for Transport and Power won the argument within the Cabinet?

I happen to know something about transport, and I think the Minister knows that, and I will sincerely advise him to have another look at the advice he has got from several executives in CIE who possibly brought in a minority report in regard to this matter. These are people who are old railwaymen, who know their jobs and weigh their evidence and advice against that of some of the new found-outs the Minister imposed on the top executive of CIE—people who were managers of chewing-gum factories or the like. They are people who spent their lives in the railway, who came up from the grade of porter to guard and to signal-man and to stationmaster. Some of them are now sales managers or area managers and the Minister should weigh up their evidence and advice against that of some of the new found-outs who were recruited, not personally by the Minister but inadvisedly through the agency of the Minister by the chairmen of Fianna Fáil organisations. That has happened and the Minister knows it has happened.

Mr. Childers

It has nothing to do with the Bill or with the section.

Mr. Casey

I am not accusing the Minister of any personal implication in this but I am saying that he has been remiss in this, and if he provokes me, I will quote names. He has recruited into the higher executive grade of CIE people——

An Ceann Comhairle

Will the Deputy——

Mr. Casey

——whose only qualification was that they were good——

An Ceann Comhairle

Can the Deputy say how this is related to the amendment?

Mr. Casey

It is related in this way that the Minister has inserted section 3 with advice from the Board of CIE and I am endeavouring to put the Minister back on the rails by telling him he has——

An Ceann Comhairle

We really cannot go back on appointments made——

Mr. Barry

As long as the rails are left down.

An Ceann Comhairle

We cannot go back to appointments made and question the authority for them.

Mr. Childers

This is an enabling Bill. I cannot understand the relevance of any of this.

Mr. Casey

I take it that there is only one Chairman of this House? The Minister is not the Chairman. I am trying to relate my remarks to the fact that the Minister must have had some advice from the Board of CIE.

An Ceann Comhairle

Appointments to that Board do not relevantly arise.

Mr. Casey

I would not wish to raise that point.

An Ceann Comhairle

That is what I understood——

Mr. Casey

No; I am making the point that the Minister, before he incorporated this section in the Bill, must have got advice from CIE, from some working party and ultimately, I presume, from the Chairman and Board of CIE, that this line should be closed. I am simply trying to help the Minister in saying he should have a second look at the advice he got and should investigate the sources from which he got it. I am saying that in the most helpful fashion and I hope the Minister will accept it in this way. People who know something about transport—and I do not mean these fuzzy-wuzzy people of work study, for whom the Minister has a great regard, time and motion experts and work study experts—railwaymen in all grades, from the lowest to the highest, who have worked from 30 to 50 years on the railways and who know what they are talking about, consider that this is the most stupid thing the Minister has ever done. Without intending any personal insult, I must confess the Minister has done many stupid things in his time as far as public transport is concerned. I would appeal to him to withdraw the section from the Bill, that he should accept——

An Ceann Comhairle

Amendment No. 1 is under discussion.

Mr. Casey

That is Deputy Kyne's amendment?

An Ceann Comhairle

The two are being discussed together.

Mr. Casey

When the Minister moved his amendment, he explained that it made no substantial difference to the Bill as circulated and that it was simply a change in the wording. Therefore the point at issue is Deputy Kyne's amendment. I would ask the Minister to accept Deputy Kyne's amendment to delete this section, until he has had second thoughts on the matter. I can assure him that I will give him any assistance I can give him and there is some evidence available to me which I would gladly place at his disposal, and that the trade unions concerned, and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, will willingly co-operate with the Minister in an intelligent and reasonable discussion on the matter.

I would ask the Minister not to steamroll this through the House. Many of his own Party know quite well, and must have conveyed to him, that this is a foolish thing. I should not like the Minister to project himself further, as he has been doing in the past, as the enemy of public transport. Unfortunately, inadvertently or otherwise, the Minister is now regarded by everybody who knows anything about transport and by users of public transport as a man with a policy of liberalising transport, denationalising it, letting it be a free-for-all.

An Ceann Comhairle

I am sorry to interrupt the Deputy, but he seems to be dealing with general matters. This is a particular amendment to section 3 and I suggest he should address himself to that.

Mr. Childers

This is an amendment dealing with the abandonment of a railway after it has been closed. It does not even refer to the closing of a railway.

Mr. Barry

Is that not putting the cart before the horse?

Mr. Casey

What is being debated here is the closure of the line between Mallow and Waterford. You can wrap it up in all sorts of technicalities and say what you like about it, but the fact is that the representatives of the people here are being asked to decide whether or not we will give the Minister power to close the line between Mallow and Waterford. Deputy Kyne's amendment is designed not to give that power to the Minister; we should not write into the Statute Book any such power. I grant you there are transport problems and, I perhaps more than anyone else in this House, realise the difficulties of CIE. The Minister will admit, I think, that the trade unions have been most co-operative and have done their best in relation to the re-organisation of CIE. We have entered into consultations. We have made permissible arrangements suitable to the unions, to the Board and to the Ministry of Transport and Power. We are willing at all times to do that again and I only wish the Minister would at some stage, at some dinner, or at some chamber of commerce meeting, acknowledge the co-operation he has got from the trade unions.

An Ceann Comhairle

I do not like to interrupt the Deputy, but clearly he is not addressing himself to the amendment before the House. I must ask him either to address himself to the amendment or to cease speaking.

Mr. Casey

I will conclude by appealing to the Minister to accept the amendment to delete section 3. If, at some later date, he feels it might be profitable to discuss the matter again, as a result of further consultations with all the interests involved, including the residents in the affected towns, the public representatives, the Board of CIE and the trade unions concerned, then he might re-introduce it, but I would appeal to him to accept the amendment and withdraw the particular section at this stage.

Mr. Childers

I very much regret I cannot accede to the Deputy's request. The purpose of this Bill is to enable CIE to make a final decision as to whether or not to close this line. CIE have agreed to accept a deputation to discuss all the matters mentioned in the course of the debate. That seems to me to be very reasonable. It is not true to say that there was some tremendous unheaval within the Board of CIE over the provisions of this Bill. It is merely an enabling Bill and CIE have still to make the final decision. In the usual way, I shall get the decision of the Board. If we were to hear the views of all sorts of groups and cabals, the situation would be utterly impossible, not alone for CIE but for any State company. The Minister has to be particularly careful not even to appear to be intervening and he would be doing just that if he were to hear all the views of the conflicting interests and groups. Management would obviously become impossible in such circumstances. Dr. Andrews's decision to retire later this year has nothing whatever to do with either general policy in relation to transport or with this Bill. I can assure the Deputy of that certainly.

I was asked about the traffic figures taken three years ago. They have been checked since and have been found essentially to represent the 1965-66 position. In reply to Deputy Barry, the House probably knows that CIE established not many years ago a modern accountancy system through the medium of which they can ascertain receipts and expenditure and losses along certain sectors of line and apply proportion of overhead costs to a particular section, thereby finding the profit or losses in running the line.

The British Government do not have to pass a Bill as a result of this measure. British Railways simply signify their consent. They make neither a profit nor a loss out of it. This is entirely the responsibility of CIE and it was for legal reasons we thought it necessary to have a Bill because of the original joint control by British Railways and CIE.

Mr. Barry

Does this mean, in effect, the closure of the Waterford-Mallow line?

Mr. Childers

Strictly speaking, this is an enabling Bill.

Mr. Barry

Is it not tantamount to closure?

An Ceann Comhairle

This opens up the whole question all over again and I cannot allow that to happen. Even in Committee, I cannot allow repetition.

Mr. Kyne

Surely I am entitled to speak after the Minister?

An Ceann Comhairle

All I am trying to do is to avoid repetition.

Mr. Barry

It is very seldom I repeat myself.

Mr. Kyne

I am not anxious to prolong the debate, but there are some points I should like to contradict. The Minister talked about parallel lines in West Waterford. Surely the Minister does not suggest that the line going to Clonmel has any connection with West Waterford?

Mr. Childers

I was talking about heavy traffic.

Mr. Kyne

That is to Cork and Limerick, but not to Waterford as such. The Minister ignored that and I want to emphasise it. If the Minister's amendment is passed without a vote, does that mean that my amendment is automatically ruled out and no vote can be taken on it?

An Ceann Comhairle

If the Minister's amendment is carried, Deputy Kyne's amendment may not be moved.

Mr. Kyne

That is what I thought. I wanted to be clear about my rights. I have to insist on putting the Minister's amendment to a vote.

Mr. Casey

May I make this point?

An Ceann Comhairle

I cannot allow any further point to be made. I am putting the amendment.

Amendment put.

The Committee divided: Tá, 63; Níl, 44.

Tá

• Aiken, Frank.
• Allen, Lorcan.
• Andrews, David.
• Blaney, Neil T.
• Boland, Kevin.
• Boylan, Terence.
• Brady, Philip.
• Brennan, Joseph.
• Brennan, Paudge.
• Breslin, Cormac.
• Briscoe, Ben.
• Burke, Patrick J.
• Calleary, Phelim A.
• Carter, Frank.
• Carty, Michael.
• Childers, Erskine.
• Clohessy, Patrick.
• Colley, George.
• Collins, James J.
• Corry, Martin J.
• Cotter, Edward.
• Crinion, Brendan.
• Cronin, Jerry.
• Crowley, Flor.
• Crowley, Honor M.
• Davern, Don.
• de Valera, Vivion.
• Dowling, Joe.
• Egan, Nicholas.
• Fanning, John.
• Faulkner, Pádraig.
• Fitzpatrick, Thomas J. (Dublin).
• Flanagan, Seán.
• Foley, Desmond.
• Gallagher, James.
• Geoghegan, John.
• Gibbons, James M.
• Gilbride, Eugene.
• Gogan, Richard P.
• Healy, Augustine A.
• Hillery, Patrick J.
• Hilliard, Michael.
• Kenneally, William.
• Kennedy, James J.
• Lalor, Patrick J.
• Lemass, Noel T.
• Lemass, Seán.
• Lenihan, Brian.
• Lenihan, Patrick.
• Lynch, Celia.
• Lynch, Jack.
• McEllistrim, Thomas.
• Meaney, Tom.
• Millar, Anthony G.
• Mooney, Patrick.
• Moore, Seán.
• Moran, Michael.
• Nolan, Thomas.
• Ó Briain, Donnchadh.
• Ó Ceallaigh, Seán.
• O'Connor, Timothy.
• O'Malley, Donogh.
• Smith, Patrick.

Níl

• Barry, Richard.
• Belton, Luke.
• Belton, Paddy.
• Burke, Joan T.
• Casey, Seán.
• Clinton, Mark A.
• Cluskey, Frank.
• Dockrell, Maurice E.
• Donegan, Patrick S.
• Dunne, Seán.
• Dunne, Thomas.
• Esmonde, Sir Anthony C.
• Farrelly, Denis.
• Fitzpatrick, Thomas J. (Cavan).
• Gilhawley, Eugene.
• Harte, Patrick D.
• Hogan O'Higgins, Brigid.
• Kenny, Henry.
• Kyne, Thomas A.
• L'Estrange, Gerald.
• Lyons, Michael D.
• McLaughlin, Joseph.
• Connor, Patrick.
• Corish, Brendan.
• Cosgrave, Liam.
• Creed, Donal.
• Crotty, Patrick J.
• Desmond, Eileen.
• Dillon, James M.
• Murphy, William.
• Norton, Patrick.
• O'Donnell, Patrick.
• O'Donnell, Tom.
• O'Hara, Thomas.
• O'Higgins, Michael J.
• O'Higgins, Thomas F.K.
• O'Leary, Michael.
• Pattison, Séamus.
• Reynolds, Patrick J.
• Ryan, Richie.
• Sweetman, Gerard.
• Tierney, Patrick.
• Treacy, Seán.
• Tully, James.

Tellers: Tá, Deputies Carty and Geoghegan; Níl, Deputies James Tully and L'Estrange.

Amendment declared carried.

Amendment No. 1a not moved.

Section 3, as amended, agreed to.

Section 4 agreed to.

SECTION 5.

Mr. Childers

I move amendment No. 2:

In page 3, lines 25 to 28, to delete subsection (3) and to substitute the following subsection:

"() An application to the Circuit Court under this section shall, at the election of the person making the application, be made to a judge of the Dublin Circuit or to the judge of the circuit where such person resides or has his principal place of business."

This amendment is in order that people who wish to approach the Circuit Court to have their claims to redundancy decided may choose the Dublin Circuit Court or any other Circuit Court they like. This is to facilitate CIE and people applying for the settlement of their claims. If the work is largely concentrated in Dublin, there will be a judge available who will have experience of the complicated issues of redundancy.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Childers

I move amendment No. 3:

In subsection (5) page 3, line 36, to delete "subsection (6) to (10) of section 43" and substitute "section 43 (6) to (10)".

This is purely a drafting amendment which expresses what is contained in the previous amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Section 5, as amended, agreed to.

Title agreed to.

Bill reported with amendments, received for final consideration and passed.