Steven Matthews (Wicklow, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and his officials and thank them for their attendance and for the briefing material provided, which has already been circulated to members of the committee. This meeting has been convened to consider the Supplementary Estimate for Vote 34 - housing, local government and heritage, which was referred to the committee by the Dáil. While the committee has no role in approving the Estimate, there is an opportunity for the committee to make the process more transparent and to engage on relevant performance issues in a meaningful way.

I propose to proceed by asking the Minister to give a high-level overview of the pressures impacting on the Department's performance and related expenditure in each programme area in 2020. I would appreciate it if he could keep his comments to five minutes, as we have to be out of here by 11 a.m. After discussing the programme areas detailed in the briefing papers, if members wish to pose questions relating to any issues not covered by the briefing they may do so. I remind everyone that we are under severe time constraints.