Iarnrod Eireann is expected to run normal or near-normal services on most routes over the weekend and provide five special trains for the two GAA matches in Croke Park on Sunday. However, there is still no sign of resolution to the five-week-old dispute with the Irish Locomotive Drivers' Association (ILDA).
The Joint Oireachtas Committee of Public Enterprise and Transport is to hold a special hearing on the Iarnrod Eireann dispute next Tuesday. It has invited representatives of the company, SIPTU, the National Bus and Railworkers' Union and Irish Fertilizer Industries.
The ILDA is lobbying members of the committee for an invitation, but the committee faces the problem that, if ILDA is invited, other parties may withdraw.
Yesterday ILDA's executive secretary, Mr Brendan Ogle, said holding the hearings without the ILDA would be akin to having a football match with only one team.
The meeting was originally called before it emerged that IFI would be able to reopen its Arklow plant. It was not clear yesterday if the invitation to IFI would stand.
Although the ILDA refused to co-operate with the provision of trains to keep Arklow open, Mr Ogle said: "If the IFI workers can go back to work, good luck to them, but our focus must be our own members who have been locked out since June 18th."
Last week the company invited a number of ILDA members to meet their local managers to discuss any grievances they had over working the new rosters introduced on June 18th. However, Mr Ogle said members had been advised not to accept any requests for meetings and to refer the company back to the ILDA.
He was also critical of the Chambers of Commerce of Ireland for their threat of legal action against the ILDA and its individual members. Mr Ogle said his members had no contracts with the chambers or their affiliates. The association was not responsible for losses arising from the dispute. A spokesman for Iarnrod Eireann said normal services would run on the Dublin-Belfast, Dublin-Rosslare and Dublin-Galway lines. There would be almost a full service on the Dublin-Limerick line. There would be seven trains from Dublin to Cork and five from Cork to Dublin.
Two-thirds of the Dundalk/Drogheda suburban service would operate, but only six trains on the Kildare Arrow service. The DART would operate normally, but Westport trains would continue to operate only as far as Athlone.