Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Moving on to a more difficult area, flood risk management, all of what Ms McGrath mentioned is in some way under somebody's control, but with flood risk management and flood defence work the OPW can spend X amount of money, build X number of walls, redirect rivers and so on. It can see what can be done, which is the output, but the difference between outputs and outcome might take a long time to become clear. The OPW might do its end of it right, but events outside its control, from Mother Nature, might intervene. How can the OPW know, in a big project like that, the value of its outputs when the outcomes are outside its control?