Progressive Democrats leader Michael McDowell repeated his attack on the Green Party today but insisted that he was not engaging in negative politics.
The Tánaiste, who was speaking at the launch of the PDs transport policy document this afternoon, warned voters that the Green Party was in favour of ending Ireland's roads programme, a development which he said would have "disastrous consequences" for the economy.
Michael McDowell at the launch of his party's Transport policy today. Image: Eric Luke.
"This is not negative campaigning. This is fact. An efficient road network is critical to the economy - and to people's quality of life," said McDowell.
"The Green Party has said that it wants to provide for environmental and safety gains rather than new road capacity and it has also said that the spending on ratio on roads compared to the figure for public transport needs to be reversed."
McDowell claimed that Ireland would end up a second-class economy if we were to walk away from the roads programme and said that contrary to the Greens, the PDs were "totally committed" to it.
"Putting people like the Greens into the heart of government can't spell good news for the roads programme," said McDowell.
"Transport 21 is concerned with developing the motorway programme along certain lines and if a party gets into government which is antagonistic to that there is no reason to believe a coherent enthusiastic programme will work," he added.
Among the policies outlined by the PDs this afternoon is a proposal to bring forward the construction of a new outer ring road around Dublin which would link the M7, M4, M3, M2 and M1.
The party also committed to investing €2 billion on the development of Dublin Airport and promised to reform the bus market in Dublin. It also reiterated its commitment to moving Dublin port to Breamore near Balbriggan in order to free up more than 600 acres of real estate for phased redevelopment.
Lastly, the PDs outlined a number of new road safety initiatives which include bringing mandatory road safety training for second level students.
