People Before Profit candidate Maisie McMaster calls for massive investment in public transport
With the General Election just around the corner, Galway West candidate for People Before Profit, Maisie McMaster is committed to investing in public transport in Galway City.
As part of her election campaign, Maisie aims to tackle the chronic traffic problems in Galway City while also reducing carbon emissions.
When speaking to Galway Pulse Maisie explained, “what we would like to see is better buses, so that we are less dependent on cars. This will alleviate some of the traffic issues.”
“We would also invest €500m in expanding bus services across the country.”
When asked about the proposal for the Gluas, Maisie replied, “we would support it, we just want to see more investment for public infrastructure to come away from our dependence on private cars.”
In relation to carbon emissions, Maisie stated, “we’re eco-socialists, so we take the environment into consideration with everything we do.”
The Galway West candidate also said, “People Before Profit would double capital investment in public transport infrastructure.”
“For Galway this would mean reopening the Western Rail Corridor between Galway and Sligo while increasing capacity on routes to Dublin and Limerick to reduce overcrowding.”
In relation to other issues at the forefront of people’s minds coming up to the General Election, Maisie was asked about the cost of living crisis and what PBP will do to tackle this problem.
“One of the biggest issues, especially for me as a young person in my 20s is housing and spending, people have been pouring money into rent for years and years, which is another reason why they can’t save up and buy a house.”
“We want to see accessible, affordable housing, public housing and rent caps in relation to people’s incomes so that it’s affordable for them to live.”
As the Palestine Israeli conflict is another key issue for voters, Maisie was also asked about PBP’s solidarity with Palestine.
“A lot of our members have been active in this for decades, not just in the last year. What we need to see is the Occupied Territories Bill enacted.”
“This was a massive failure of the current government, when there was the time to do it before calling an election.”
Maisie continued by saying, “we need to see sanctions and no more compliances in having US troops and war planes coming through Shannon airport.”
“We need to stop that now, because again the government has been aware of this for months and has carried out no inspections and has taken no action to end it.”
The 22 year old PBP candidate is currently studying art full time in Galway, Maisie is also an eco-socialist activist and has been involved in youth activism and politics over the past seven years.
Earlier this year, Maisie ran in the local elections for PBP in Galway City West, however, she was unelected.
