Mayo plea over safety implications of not maintaining line markings

A Mayo Oireachtas member has raised concerns over what he described as 'serious health and safety implications for towns and villages throughout Ireland'.

Senator Mark Duffy elaborated: "This week the father of a child with a disability took action himself to repaint a disability bay in Westport which had depleted and faded.

"During my time as a councillor, we regularly called for councils and local authorities to have line painting services carried out in-house.

"No local authorities in Ireland own line painting services and we rely on contractors to do the work.

"It rains twice as much on the west coast of Ireland as it does on the east coast, so the window for carrying out line painting services is very short, over the summer period.

"This means disability parking bays, junction line painting and simple basic services that are hugely impactful for road safety, whether continuous white lines in housing estates, clearway junctions to keep dropped kerbs free of any parking so that wheelchair users can move freely through towns and villages, or those who are elderly or have disability badges having the dignity of having their own space.

"Small, basic jobs, such as line painting services, are not being carried out in local authorities throughout the country.

"We need to have a discussion on this because it is simply not good enough that the father of a child has to paint his own disabled bay blue because the local authority has been dragging its heels on this.

"I am sure other local authorities are more effective on this issue but we should not have to rely on citizens to take ownership of this issue.

"We should have a discussion and address this issue for the health and safety of citizens throughout the country."