Road Safety: Statements
Seanad Éireann — 2026-09-30
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Sarah O'Reilly (AON), Agricultural Panel

I welcome this debate and that it is varied, that everyone is not sticking to the same issues of enforcement and drugs testing, although they are important. However, there is also the issue I will focus on, which is the condition of our roads. In Cavan and Monaghan, there are roads that used to be cart track and which have just had a layer of tar put over them. There is no real strength in the roads for the traffic that is on them. There are roads which the new Local Link buses are too big for. The buses, lorries and trucks are halfway over the white line when travelling on them. That is causing a lot of concern among people, as are hedges growing out over roads. That is also a safety concern. It pushes trucks out. If a person breaks a mirror on a truck, it could cost €3,000.
I was at a meeting on Monday with councillors in the Carrickmacross municipal district who are looking for more roads funding because they can only do 2% of the roads. We are expected to travel on roads that are essentially defective and there is not enough money to resurface and put in place good road structures. That is a major problem, because in July the councillors from Cavan County Council were also looking for more roads funding and they feel their words are falling on deaf ears. Does the RSA communicate much with the councils? Is the Minister of State asking councils whether they are getting enough money to make and keep the roads safe? A lot of the time, there are road safety issues. The low-cost safety schemes - we used to get three in our area - have been reduced to one, and that is also a problem, with dangerous junctions like the ones Senator Cathal Byrne spoke about.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-09-30/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-30