Bernard J. Durkan
Question:310 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the number of persons who quality for and avail of free travel; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15298/00]
Written Answers. - Free Travel.
The free travel scheme operated by my Department is available to all people living in the State aged 66 years or over as well as to incapacitated people under that age who are in receipt of certain welfare type payments. The scheme provides eligible people, including spouses and in certain cases companions, with free travel on a range of services provided by the CIE group of companies and by 76 private transport operators. It also provides reciprocal travel facilities for passholders to travel to and from Northern Ireland. The scheme is estimated to cost £34.70 million in 2000. There are currently 564,000 people with a free travel pass.
To avail of free travel on any of the services covered by the scheme, a pass-holder presents his/her pass to the relevant transport operator. The Department has contract arrangements with the various transport operators involved, with payments to them based broadly on the number of journeys undertaken under the scheme.
The information available in this process does not identify the individual users of the service. In the circumstances the Department does not have statistics on the number of pass-holders who avail of the facility to travel free.