Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has dismissed a suggestion that Travel Pass holders be banned from using public transport during the rush hour.<\/p>\n
The Sinn F\u00e9in TD was responding to reports that the Secretary General of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, Robert Watt, floated an idea to ban holders of the free travel pass from public transport during rush hour.<\/p>\n
Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe said:<\/p>\n
\u201cThis suggestion is not helpful and should be dismissed by legislators and commuters who use the bus and rail services.<\/p>\n
\u201cPublic transport isn\u2019t at capacity because of free travel pass holders but it is overcrowded at times because of a lack of investment and poor planning by successive governments.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese latest remarks are not new but are indicative of an increasingly worrying trend that blames everyone and anyone but leaves the real culprits, consecutive Transport Ministers, out of the blame game.<\/p>\n
“They have left our bus and rail semi states in precarious financial positions, and this is reflected in uneven and patchy public transport services.<\/p>\n
“Poor planning and a lack of investment in infrastructure for decades in Dublin has led to significant overcrowding on public transport in the city.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany commentators fail to or ignore the fact that public transport has responsibilities and is a public service. It\u2019s not about profit, and it\u2019s certainly not about banning people who might not be deemed important enough by Mr Watt to travel during rush hour. Every member of the public regardless of their card should be entitled to make use of that service.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey also appear to be unaware or oblivious of the pressures that senior citizens experience in Irish society. The elderly and people with disabilities are groups that are at risk of isolation and poverty. They have to attend appointments and other engagements at the same time as everyone else.<\/p>\n
“This week research from the Healthy and Positive Ageing Initiative showed that almost a third of all senior citizens have difficulties accessing public transport, with it rising up to 68% in rural areas<\/p>\n
\u201cSurely its time that officials like Mr Watt should focusing their attention on this reality and work towards greater investment in public transport, and leave hard pressed travel pass holders alone.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has dismissed a suggestion that Travel Pass holders be banned from using public transport during the rush hour. The Sinn F\u00e9in TD was responding to reports that the Secretary General of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, Robert Watt, floated an idea to ban holders of the free […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,387],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-transport","category-travel-pass"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3502"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3502\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3503,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3502\/revisions\/3503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}