Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. He is absolutely right. We have an ambitious programme for Rosslare Europort. The Deputy is also right that this is not an insignificant investment that we are about to embark on. It involves the OPW, Irish Rail, Wexford County Council, the local community, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, the Revenue Commissioners and a host of local agencies. The investment is enormous by local standards. It is worth €150 million. It represents a site of 10,700 sq. m. made up of 19 buildings that will provide a new border control for the country. We have seen the traffic into and out of Rosslare Europort in recent months. The additional new services operated in the port dictate we have to provide additional new services for hauliers coming in and out of there. The OPW has been charged with this. The spend to date by our Brexit unit on a range of measures is €81 million. This is capital spending across all of the headings provided for.

In his question the Deputy mentioned the work we have done on Dublin Port. Our short-term ambition for this set of Estimates is focused on Rosslare. We see the potential for Rosslare to be an additional node into the country and the additional border control point we need given the traffic being generated through the port. We know remote access from the port causes difficulties in terms of time delays. It is about ease of access out of the port. Wexford County Council, Iarnród Éireann and the hauliers will provide support in terms of anecdotal evidence, as will Revenue and other port users, as to the final design. This will be supported by the European Union and will represent a massive investment into County Wexford. The Deputy has seen the scale and finished product of what the OPW did in Dublin Port. Other Deputies may not have seen it. The manner in which we were able to turn it around and the speed with which we were able to turn it around are a credit to OPW staff, including our internal architects and engineering staff. We were asked to do it in a very short period of time. The same will be able to be accrued in Wexford.