Mr. Robert Watt:

There may be occasions on which a Government needs to make a decision to do something quickly or where it is clear that the benefits of investing in that infrastructure or spending that money are such that they have to, out of necessity, due to time constraints, push ahead. For example, with the recent flooding where there was significant damage to part of the country, it was clear that we needed to invest to restore the road or pavement and it would not necessarily be the case that one would need to do a cost-benefit analysis to demonstrate that one needed to invest in improving a road which had been subjected to damage. That is just an example. In most cases, the code is there to ensure that, when we look at projects over €20 million, we have a full assessment of the costs and benefits.

We debated for a long time the question of whether the threshold is appropriate or should perhaps be lower or higher. This issue is being kept under review to ensure sponsoring bodies have to develop strong business cases. When they are deciding to commit to a project, they must be disciplined and have evidence that the benefits exceed the costs. When we are dealing with cost-benefit analyses, in many cases the benefits of a project are uncertain or difficult to establish. There are many issues with the actual methodology or the approach to assessing the costs and benefits of particular projects. There is an element of subjectivity here. What is stated in the code is very important in ensuring Departments meet value-for-money criteria.