The Transport Minister must explain why the replacement of Irish Rail’s IT system is such an omnishambles and who is responsible, according to Social Democrats TD Aidan Farrelly.
Deputy Farrelly, who sits on the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee, said:
“Last month, it was revealed that Irish Rail had written down the value of a new IT system by €50 million. Today, we learned that the risk of service interruptions has been heightened by the its inability to source replacement parts for the existing system.
“Irish Rail has just two spare central processing units for the critical traffic management system, which was commissioned more than 20 years ago and was supposed to have been replaced in 2024.
“This raises further serious questions for Irish Rail – chief among them, why has this project become such an omnishambles and who is responsible for this fiasco?
“There have been many examples of monumental waste by the government and the public sector over recent years, but a €50 million write down of one IT project is unprecedented.
“The fact that the continued operation of the entire traffic control system, which oversees the movement of trains, is so precarious is deeply concerning.
“It’s time for the Minister for Transport to step in and take control of this runaway train. Minister O’Brien must now provide answers as to why the replacement of this critical system has been delayed for so long, what happened to the €50m assigned to this project and what are the immediate and long term implications for passengers.”
June 8th, 2026