Micheál Carrigy (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I apologise. I do not mean to cut across the Minister, but someone driving from those brand-new investment, top-of-the-range roads then hits the section at Longford. People coming from Mayo will meet the N4 in Longford. They will have a brilliant road the whole way to Mullingar, but from there to Roosky that 50 km road is not fit for purpose. We are then spending hundreds of millions on the far side of it. In between, there is a road that has a capacity for 11,000 cars but 18,000 cars are on it. It does not make sense. As I said, we have to have balanced regional development and we are not getting our fair share.

There are eight designed routes at present that went out for public consultation. People that I know, who live in my area and are neighbours, are on those routes. They now do not know what the preferred route will be because the process has stalled. What will happen is that all the routes will be stalled with regard to planning, etc. We have to provide the funding to at least get to a situation where a designated final route is decided on. We will then know how to go forward.