We have returned to the usual heavy traffic congestion following last week's mid-term break. Dublin has been ranked the third worst city in the world, in of a survey of 200 cities, when it comes to the time normal people spend in traffic. Dublin commuters lose an average of nearly five hours every week sitting in traffic jams. There is a pressing need for a grand plan for public transport, not least to address the issue of lowering our carbon emissions. The public accepts this.

In my judgment it demands a better public transport system, but what I am hearing is a great deal of public anxiety about the Government's two major transport projects, MetroLink and BusConnects, on which it is spending €5 billion. Can we have confidence in the Government's ability to deliver on these projects following the 100% overrun to date on the national children's hospital? Is the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform closely monitoring these projects?

One hundred and twenty-three years ago, Glasgow opened its first subway. We are still talking about building Dublin's first metro line. Originally, we had the Dublin north plan from Fingal to the city centre, but then we had the economic crash. We then had MetroLink to link the metro with the existing green Luas line. What has happened now, because that last project seems to have been scrapped? Will the Taoiseach give the House, the people of Dublin and the nation clarity on that matter? The proposed metro line will not solve congestion problems for many Dubliners, which is where BusConnects comes in to rethink the entire bus system. However, the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Ross, seems to have distanced himself from BusConnects and handed over power to unelected officials. From many reports I am getting, those leading the public consultations seem to be involved in box ticking without real concern for the anxieties of the people. I am told that at a public meeting yesterday, the Fine Gael Deputy, Colm Brophy, said that he had a lack of confidence in BusConnects. I understand the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Catherine Byrne, called the National Transport Authority dictators. There seems to be more focus on the electoral prospects of Fine Gael Deputies than on providing the vision of a high-quality public transport system. Will the Government provide for a full and complete debate in this House to test fully its vision for Dublin's future transport system? Will the Taoiseach give the House a guarantee that the Government's plan has been future-proofed to meet the transport needs of a city that we expect to expand greatly in the coming decade, which is to be accommodated with a world-class transport system?

I thank the Deputy. As he knows, I represent the commuter constituency of Dublin West and, more so than most in this House, I am very aware of the daily impact congestion has on our constituents. Huge numbers of people from my constituency are spending perhaps two hours on the bus every day, which is ten hours a week and is time that could be spent with their families, engaged in recreation or sporting activities, or even taking up an evening class and further study. One thing we want to do over the next couple of years as the city continues to expand and grow and as our population and employment continues to increase is to improve and reduce commuting times for people who commute to work in the Dublin area. We have detailed plans already such as the National Transport Authority's greater Dublin transport plan running to 2030 and Project Ireland 2040. We need to get on with those plans and implement them. That is why I am so concerned at suggestions from some Members of the Opposition that we should suspend Project Ireland 2040-----

What about your own?

-----and carry out a review of it.

The children's hospital.

It would be an enormous mistake to delay these important plans and investments in public transport.

In terms of what we can do, we can implement Project Ireland 2040 to ensure that the cities other than Dublin grow twice as fast as Dublin. Part of the solution to congestion in Dublin is Cork, Limerick, Waterford, Galway and other urban centres like Athlone, Sligo, Dundalk and Drogheda growing twice as fast as Dublin. We can turn around a millennium of development in Ireland and move it into a different direction, but it has to be part of the solution. We can invest in cycling and pedestrian facilities, a lot of which is under way already. The Deputy will have seen many of the improvements around the city but much more needs to be done in that regard. We can also invest in public transport projects like Bus Connects, to which I am very committed. Notwithstanding the disruption it will cause for some, it will benefit the many in terms of reducing journey times, perhaps by half, in suburban Dublin. We can also invest in rail, much of which is done already. Luas and Luas cross city are now up and running. They were criticised and opposed by many. It did overrun, not cross city but the early elements, but I doubt anyone regrets now that the Luas was built, and there are demands every day for new lines. The Phoenix Park tunnel is open, allowing for better connections between the Kildare commuter routes and the city centre, and the metro is now out for design.

The truth is that we have to engage with the public and it is right to engage with the public on design to get it right. That is happening with BusConnects and it is happening with MetroLink. People have genuine concerns because it disrupts their sports clubs, it can disrupt their schools, it can involve taking away their parking and it can involve taking away parts of their gardens. We should not dismiss genuine concerns from communities, whether it is Na Fianna GAA club, whether it is people in Ranelagh or whether it is people out in Terenure. We should not dismiss their concerns. We are not a dictatorship; this is not the Soviet Union and it is not the 19th century in Glasgow. We do not just run roughshod over people and communities so the right thing to do-----

The Government did it in rural Ireland.

The right thing to do is-----

The Government forgot about rural Ireland.

The right thing to do is to listen to people's concerns-----

To hell with us.

-----take into account what communities have to say, amend those plans, as appropriate, and then go ahead and get them done.

I am sure people will be delighted with the Taoiseach's empathy for their difficulties. The two projects that he instanced as successes, namely the Luas Cross City and the Phoenix Park tunnel, were carried out by the previous Government, as the Taoiseach will recall.

I know.

Yes, the two projects that the Taoiseach is responsible for are the ones I have asked him about. Where stands MetroLink now? Will it be the original plan or the modified plan? What is happening with it? We seem to always be planning but never delivering.

On BusConnects, it is lovely that the Taoiseach is interested and that the Government is not a Soviet dictatorship but what does that mean? Will we have a decent plan or, as many people are concerned about now from listening to the Taoiseach's representatives going to public meetings around the city, is all of this just talk at the end of the day and because there is political pushback, nothing will be delivered? What is the status of BusConnects and what exactly is the Taoiseach's plan for MetroLink?

As the Deputy will recall, I was a member of the previous Government and, for three and a half years of that, I was the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport and we delivered on a lot of projects, including the Phoenix Park tunnel-----

The previous Government did a lot of harm too.

-----the Luas extension to City West, Luas Cross City and other projects around the country as well-----

It is this Government I am more concerned about. I acknowledge the success of the previous Government.

-----such as the N11 and the Gort to Tuam motorway.

Regarding what we are delivering under this Government, it is BusConnects and MetroLink but these are very big projects. Let us not forget that BusConnects is not just for Dublin, it is for other cities as well. It is a €2 billion investment in buses and cycling facilities and people often forget that aspect of it. It is greatly beneficial for cyclists as well. It is impossible to cost MetroLink for certain at this stage but it is also a multi-billion euro investment in public transport from the north of County Dublin through to the city centre. These projects involve public consultation, however, and that is the stage that we are at now with BusConnects and MetroLink. Public consultation is under way, the NTA is listening and it will come back with revised plans. When it comes back with revised plans, we will be able to apply for railway orders and planning permission, then put them out to tender and then get a realistic final cost. It is only when we goes to tender that we will know the real cost and then make a final decision on whether we proceed.

The consultation on MetroLink will not be easy if we do not have the full engineering facts. As I understand it, we will not get the revised solution and the revised options on the southside of the city until the end of March. We are flying slightly blind without that. The engineers will rightly say that the greater Dublin transport strategy set out their preferred approach but nobody understood at that time that the Government would go with the driverless, segregated system that would affect the southside in the way it might, or that it would change the entire route because it would not build the DART Interconnector, which was another critical piece of infrastructure that it effectively abandoned.

There are three options, one of which would be to connect with the green line in whatever way. We will have to wait until March for the detail to see what the preferred solution on that is. The engineers may well rightly say that is still their preferred solution as it always was. We have to hear what they have to say. Second, good engineers say to me that when a tunnel machine is running it is so much cheaper and easier to keep going and the route south west to Terenure, Rathfarnham and Tallaght would be of great benefit to that section of the city, which is very poorly served by public transport. Third, and I have raised this with the Taoiseach here in the Dáil as an option, the Government could keep the tunnel machine running south east and connect to University College Dublin, UCD and Sandyford.

It would be capable of providing for the increasing volume of traffic on the long run from Sandyford and Cherrywood on the southside and we would not have to upgrade the Luas green line. These are the three options available.

Does the Taoiseach agree that whatever solution we pick we will not abandon the southside? I am worried because the Taoiseach mentioned the metro to the city centre. If the press reports are accurate, this is what the Government is thinking and it has abandoned the southside. We cannot afford to abandon the southside, the west or the northside. Our entire transport system requires radical change. Whatever happens on the southside should not cause any delay on the northside. We should proceed with the railway order to ensure the northside section is built. Deputy Rock is shaking his head. I do not know what his view is but no doubt we will hear it. Whatever route we pick it should not undermine the case for BusConnects. We fundamentally stand with BusConnects because the projections from the NTA indicate that even with all of these projects, the transport emissions in Dublin will increase by 30% when we need them to decrease by 30% by 2030. The scale of the change we need to make is huge.

The Taoiseach mentioned consultation on this project. How do we consult when we do not have the final plans? Does the Taoiseach agree that we should not abandon the southside, that we should not delay the northside element and that we need BusConnects and the metro in order to start making the city work?

When the Deputy was in government, the grand plan was Transport 21. We were going to have the metro north, the Luas cross-city, the DART underground and the electrification of the Maynooth and Kildare lines all at the same time.

All Dublin, Dublin, Dublin.

A fortune was spent but not one of those projects was delivered. The Deputy will acknowledge, therefore, that his party has a really poor record on transport in Dublin. It promised four major projects, spent a fortune on them and delivered none. The approach we have taken has been much more incremental. The Phoenix Park tunnel is complete and the Luas lines are connected and extended. The next big steps are the electrification of the train lines to Maynooth and Drogheda, which are not in Dublin-----

It is a miracle that the Taoiseach went outside the place.

-----and out to Kildare, which is also not in Dublin.

How good it is that the Taoiseach knows somewhere outside Dublin.

Deputy Michael Healy-Rae should not forget the Macroom bypass.

There is also BusConnects and the metro. None of these projects can be done quickly and we must ensure that we sequence them right and get them right. A public consultation is under way on BusConnects and the metro link. I do not think we in the House have the competency to design the metro link. I know the Deputy has made submissions and the NTA will take them into account. I have sought a briefing from the NTA on its plans. Having completed the Phoenix Park tunnel, extended the Luas lines and, at long last, connected them, I am determined to see this through and get these projects done.

Something we could agree to do is to stop scoring petty political points on serious matters of national public policy. I fought tooth and nail for four years in government to protect the metro. I was literally fighting with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. We kept it and preserved it, only for the incoming Minister with responsibility for transport to abandon it in 2011 when European Investment Bank funding, planning permission and a railway order had been obtained in respect of it. That was one of the worst mistakes made by any politician in my time but I will not go back to those events in order to score political points.

No.

Deputy Eamon Ryan has the floor.

Such behaviour does not get us anywhere. I want answers to the three questions I have asked. We have a role. We are perfectly placed to represent our constituents and give our views on the proposals and on the various alternatives. I agree with Deputy Howlin. We need a place to debate it that does not involve just scoring petty political points but looks at the options and considers what is the best engineering solution. We must decide this on good engineering, financial and planning analysis. Where could we have that debate?

Show up to the transport committee. The Deputy has never attended the committee's meetings.

That is not true.

The Deputy's time is up. Can we not get into personal commentary please?

I ask the Taoiseach to answer the first three questions I asked and to stop trying to play politics with this matter.

I suggest that the Deputy and I agree a truce for the rest of this session: let neither of us try to score party-political or petty points on any issue, whether it is housing, climate change or transport. I would be happy to agree to that.

I am sure the Taoiseach would.

We will see from the next question asked by Deputy Eamon Ryan whether he is willing to rise to that challenge.

I am entirely agnostic regarding a debate on transport in Dublin. While a debate on it in the House would be welcome, I am not sure it would be particularly productive as, to the best of my knowledge, no Deputy is a transport engineer or an expert in this field. Perhaps the Joint Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport, chaired by Deputy O'Dowd, would be the best place for the issue to be fleshed out and debated as experts and various agencies could be brought in and Deputies with a particular interest in or knowledge of transport could engage in what might be a more meaningful way.