My Opening Statement - Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport

Chairman and members of the Committee,

Thank you for the invitation to appear before you today. ?I am joined by Philip Donohue, Director of HR and Development, and Ciarán Rogan, Chief Customer Officer.

Our work in Dublin Bus is based on a formula of service excellence and a customer centred approach. Day in, day out, drivers and mechanics, and all Dublin Bus employees reinforce this formula.

My short opening statement will focus on four challenges facing Dublin Bus:

·???????? Safety and security

·???????? Skills

·???????? Customer demand

·???????? Traffic Congestion and Variability

There is no cause for pessimism. ?But there is a need for action in the face of these challenges.

Safety and security

Dublin Bus recognises the rise in anti-social behaviour incidents across the city and the public transport network. I have consistently advocated for collaborative efforts from all stakeholders, urging the establishment of a dedicated forum to tackle these challenges collectively.

?I am pleased to report that we are currently engaging with the Department of Transport on the establishment of such a forum. Dublin Bus has commissioned an independent review of our own procedures, and we will use this forum to share outcomes and any recommendations.

We would support any action that would make transport services safer. While most will rarely, if ever, encounter anti-social behaviour on our services, our priority is ensuring every driver and customer feels safe on every journey, on every route, every time. Even one incident is one too many.

Skills

Dublin Bus has a proven track record of recruitment. Over the last two years we have recruited 870 drivers and 40 mechanics. We have also completed a very successful female recruitment campaign which has seen 94 female drivers hired. In the case of mechanics, we have recruited from Europe and in the coming months will welcome new mechanics from the Philippines to the Dublin Bus team.

The success of our recruitment campaigns should not overshadow the ongoing challenge posed by the prevailing skill shortage affecting not only Dublin Bus but also the wider transport sector.

We are ambitious as a company. We are rolling out new electric buses, implementing BusConnects and introducing additional services across Dublin.

We delivered over 146 million customer journeys in 2023. This number is likely to exceed 150 million by the end of 2024.

We must recruit more mechanics and skilled workers if we are to have any hope of meeting future customer demand.

But the skilled worker pool here in Ireland is shallower than it should be. The reality is that we lost an entire generation of apprentices. We now, as a country, need to start really ensuring that we are championing the skills industry and apprenticeship programmes. Dublin Bus for its part has increased its number of apprenticeships in recent years and currently has 60 apprentices at various stages of training with a further 23 starting later in the year.

Customer demand

Last year saw our highest customer numbers in recent years and we expect this year to deliver the highest number of customer journeys in Dublin Bus’ history.

Demand for our services is growing month on month, and I want to assure the Committee that we are not just relying on BusConnects for investment in new services but also introducing additional services on many routes across the Greater Dublin Area. We are and continue to add additional services on the many routes, seeing increased customer demand across the network.

We are determined to meet demand and grow our customer base. We can, and will improve the customer experience, making our buses more comfortable and safer, but the real key to attracting more people to use public transport is faster and more reliable journey times.

Traffic Congestion and Variability

The biggest barrier to faster and more reliable bus services is the dominance of the private car in Dublin. The Committee is aware of my views on congestion. Six out of every ten cars are using the city centre as a route to reach a destination outside of the centre.

They take up vital road space and increase journey times for people using Dublin Bus. Moving this traffic out of the city, as the NTA/DCC Transport Plan seeks to do, should not impact economic activity or cultural life. It should improve it.

Today, it can take up to 29 minutes to travel just 10km in Dublin. This is clearly not going to convince people to leave the car at home. I find this doubly frustrating because the reason for this slow progress is mostly congestion caused by cars.

Ask yourself this, is it right that a line of cars with an average of one occupant per vehicle delays a bus with 85 people on it?

It is also becoming more challenging to run a consistently punctual service while operating in a city with large variances in daily traffic congestion. For example, Mondays and Fridays are much lighter traffic days than Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. This is a consequence of the post-pandemic world, where remote working is now the norm. ??

Change is undeniably challenging. Old ways, old interests, old thinking rarely go gently or quietly. However, this should not deter us from confronting the tough decisions necessary for shaping a better Dublin. We must prioritise the collective good over individual comfort and ensure that progress for the city is not dictated by convenience.

Bus operators need more priority. We need the NTA/DCC traffic plan implemented in full. We need priority bus corridors. We need to break the dominance of the private car. We need more certainty.?

Conclusion

In conclusion chairman,

This is not about being anti-car. It is about being pro-Dublin.

A greener, cleaner, quieter Dublin - a more pleasant place to live and work,

A Dublin with more space for buses and in particular the people on them, allowing faster, more reliable journey times,

This is not some utopia,

This is something we can achieve.

Because people are voting with their feet,

They are using Dublin Bus in record numbers.

But in a competitive and uncertain environment, we cannot take recent progress for granted.

I’ve set out some of the barriers to even greater progress. I am, however, confident we can overcome them once we all work together.

And Dublin – not just Dublin Bus - will be the real winner.

Thank you again for the invitation to appear today and I look forward to your questions.