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IT IS “HIGHLY unlikely” that Holyhead port will be functioning this side of Christmas, according to Taoiseach Simon Harris.
Speaking to reporters in Dun Laoghaire today, the Taoiseach said the “seriousness” of the damage was becoming “more apparent as the days go by”.
“I think it’s highly unlikely now that we will see Holyhead port functioning in any real way this side of Christmas and of course, that is a serious concern to both people who’ve bought goods and presents and gifts that they’re hoping will arrive, and also people that are understandably trying to get home for the Christmas period,” he said.
“What I can say is this a huge amount of work is ongoing in government on this issue. Today, the Minister for Transport and the Minister of State for Transport will meet their Welsh counterparts.”
Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan and junior Minister James Lawless met with Stena Line and Irish Ferries this afternoon to seek urgent extra capacity for ferries travelling between Ireland and the UK, as tens of thousands of ferry passengers face travel chaos due to the temporary closure of Holyhead port.
The minister also met with representatives from other industries affected by the delays this morning.
Lawless acknowledged today that it “seems to be unlikely” that Holyhead port would be functional again by Christmas, despite initial hopes that the Welsh port would reopen by Thursday 19 December.
The port has been closed due to damage caused during Storm Darragh.
With the port unlikely to get the green light to open, thousands of cars are now set to reroute to different ports in Britain to travel home to Ireland.
At the moment, frustrated ferry customers are being rerouted to Birkenhead and are arriving into Belfast instead of Dublin, creating a longer ferry journey and major transport diversions for passengers.
Lawless told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland that he will meet with representatives from Stena Line and Irish Ferries this afternoon to discuss added capacity for ferries between Britain and Ireland over the festive period.
“We really need them to do everything that they can to ramp up capacity on alternative routes and add vessels and add capacity and container storage,” Lawless said.
It is hoped extra spaces in locations such as Larne and Birkenhead, near Liverpool, will provide additional capacity.
“We also need, in the case of Stena Line, them to give us accurate and timely updates as to what’s happening and Holyhead”, Lawless added.
Stena Line, owners of Holyhead Port, have cancelled all ferry services between Dublin and Holyhead until at least Friday 20th December.
Commercial shipping has also been affected by the port closure, with An Post saying in a statement yesterday that it had abandoned its plans of using Holyhead port for Christmas deliveries.
An Post added that it was confident presents would arrive on time via alternative routes despite a huge backlog of parcels.
The national postal service said 500,000 items had been diverted and reached Ireland using shipping routes from Pembrokeshire, Larne and Liverpool.
In a bid to ease shipping backlog pressures, the government agreed to a temporary extension of legal driving hours for hauliers for the next two weeks on Saturday.
The urgent rule change by the Department of Transport over the weekend saw Irish hauliers allowed to drive more and rest less in the run-up to Christmas.
Harris said today that extra capacity is being sought.
“We will look at every possibility in terms of providing additional capacity. We’ve already made it very clear that we will put on extra shuttle busses and the likes, should we be able to get other fairy crossings to other ports.
“So there’s a lot of work going on to make sure people can get home for Christmas and to make sure as many gifts as possible can be here in time for Christmas, we’ll have a further update after the meeting,” said Harris.
With reporting by Christina Finn
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Jacob Rees-Mogg predicted to lose his seat. OH PLEASE LET THAT HAPPEN!!!!
@Tricia G28: I suppose it would allow him to spend more time with his money.
@Tricia G28: He’s been described as a
“haunted Victorian pencil.”
@honey badger: Jaysus that’s some name
@honey badger:
The biggest supporters of Victorian political and academic society are found among the Journal commenters despite the prejudice towards other societies. It is fine to remember this before the 80th anniversary of D-Day when courage was on display, unlike today.
The invasion and extermination imperatives of Victorian natural selection provided the Nazis with a justification for the death and misery of WWII.
“In 500 years how the Anglo-Saxon race will have spread & exterminated whole nations; & in consequence how much the Human race, viewed as a unit, will have risen in rank.” Charles Darwin
@Gerald Kelleher: You OK Gerald?
@Gerald Kelleher: creep
I get the opportunity to undo the Victorian prejudice conviction as often as possible, and so should everyone with a bit of courage. It honours the soldiers who fought against the invasion and extermination imperatives that the Nazis reheated from Victorian natural selection.
Non-entities do not influence this topic, whereas the academic community tried to hide natural selection behind social darwinism as though they could disguise the prejudice conviction behind a Victorian icon.
The day before the anniversary of D-Day, there is a fictional, if visual, reminder that people can overcome initial cowardice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW9Q1cm_Tnw&t=53s
Once again, the opportunity to remove a Victorian prejudice conviction in the face of hostility takes courage.
Reform are set to gain a whopping ZERO seats. Anti-immigrant heads on here predicting Reform will gain a landslide because apparently “immigrants are an issue”, but only to bigoted patriots. Guess cons leaned a little too right.
@9QRixo8H: Their VERY obvious attempts to use national populism issues to try and claw back votes would be funny if there weren’t real people being damaged by their rhetoric.
@9QRixo8H: You’re absolutely right – only to bigoted patriots, or people suffering the knock-on effects of insufficient housing, overcrowded schools, doctors, hospitals or generally being overtaxed to finance the present illegal immigration scam fostered by Sinn Fein/Greens/Labour/SDs and foreign People Before Peasants
@Thomas Sheridan: all those things existed before the immigration crisis, Thomas.
@Thomas Sheridan: you’re conflating issues. And heaping the blame on the immigrant. As if they’re not human enough for a doctor’s appointment. You always had to wait hours in A and E, because FFG is not solving it. Housing is an issue coz FFG isn’t solving it. And then you blame those who are not in power for FFG’s immigration response.
@Thomas Sheridan: Here in Thomas’ world housing and health is a new issue brought on by the thousands of immigrants that don’t look like him being allowed to enter the country due to governmental policies of our…opposition parties.
Maith an fear, Tomás. Do you mind if I call you Tomás? I’ve a funny feeling you hate being called that.
The Moggy one is a funny man alright.
@Ulysses 31: ah sure you are right there. Mogg and donnacha would be some team boy.
There are plenty Irish people who actually support the like of Mogg and Farange. Just let that sink in.
@Louis Jacob: Plenty is a bit extreme,a tiny minority might.
@Louis Jacob: I like nigel
@Ulysses 31: Sorry for your troubles.
@Louis Jacob: How do you know?
Farage is wasting his time putting himself forward
@Martin Finnerty:
Not sure about that.
With a bit of luck Reform will win no more than one or two seats but Clacton is one place they might.
The only constituency ever to return a UKIP MP in a general election, at one point the least diverse constituency in the UK.
Think the UK version of Florida, lots of beeches and retired people.
Nearest thing reform has to a safe seat.
@Martin Finnerty: Nigel is a professional mud stirrer and it’s made him a very wealthy man. Britain out of the EU, but i doubt he can manage to get britian off the planet to solve its migrant population. But some British actually believe what he says
@Martin Finnerty: Not in Clacton he ain’t, the place is a trove of little Englanders.
@P. V. Aglue: That’s their problem. Full of it he is.
@Martin Finnerty: He chose well with Clacton. A Tory majority if 21000, I think. He could hive off enough Tory votes to get first place.
@Martin Finnerty: Grifters gonna grift.
Tory’s and Labour seem to be the Ff and Fg of the uk with a few small party’s getting destroyed among the way
have your say