Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the witnesses and thank them for attending. I will start with Mr. Barry on the issue of public private partnerships, PPPs, and the recommendations in paragraph 6.48, page 90, of the Comptroller and Auditor General's report. I wish to discuss the future use of these tools and how they can develop in light of Mr. Barry's points. After that, I wish to discuss with Mr. O'Mahony CIE's situation and its relationship with the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport.

I thank Mr. Barry for his explanation of how PPPs have operated in the past and the challenges they currently face. My observation on his comments is that difficulties will exist in the future use of these instruments because of the increasing reluctance of private sector actors to take on board the type of risk of previous years. The second factor compounding difficulties is the smaller amount of capital available vis-à-vis what used to be the case, which places demands on the National Roads Authority, NRA. Am I missing anything in my analysis or does it capture most of the situation?