It is impossible to put a timeframe on the proposed light rail network for Dublin because the "judicial process", the public inquiry under Judge Sean O'Leary, had not happened, the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, has said.
Judge O'Leary had been asked by the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, to look at the inquiry afresh. He would be presented with the Government's decision and "how the judge stands to interpret that" was a matter for him.
Strongly denying that she and the Cabinet had "succumbed to commercial considerations" in arriving at the decision to include an underground section in the plan, she said these interests had not "made any play" to influence her.
Describing the light rail project as "a greatly expanded vision of transport in the city and county", she told a crowded press conference last night that it would not solve all of Dublin's traffic problem but it would help.
Though the Government's objective was to proceed "without delay" with the construction of the Tallaght-city centre and Sandyford-St Stephen's Green sections, the Minister could put no time-frame on the project. The work was "subject to the relevant statutory procedures and to the necessary detailed technical confirmation on the Sandyford-St Stephen's Green section."
She said, "A decision has occurred to give the people of Dublin city and county a decent light rail system which, by its use of Harcourt Street and Broadstone, will re-energise two existing rail alignments," she said.
The Government plan involved "clear north/south, east/west lines" which would serve all the citizens well, she said.
There was a clear decision to allow for the financing of it from Exchequer funding and the desire to establish a "decent transport system" should not be "constrained" by cost. Insisting that EU money for Luas had not been "lost to Ireland", she conceded it would not be drawn down for the project.
"Its not that it (the EU funding) is lost to Luas. But we have taken a decision that is much wider than the original decision," the Minister said.
The "components" of the £400 million-plus committed to the system had yet to be decided by the Government, she added.
Saying she realised there were arguments that women were not inclined to travel on the underground at night, for security reasons, the Minister said the Atkins report had suggested ways of diminishing those fears - such as extra lighting. But she, as a woman, would feel "comfortable" using the system.