Mr. Dominic Mullaney:

On the first point, it is fair to say that the Coonagh to Knockalisheen project, although when it came to us it was quite a number of years ago and it had gone through the planning process, came as a stand-alone scheme, had its own benefit cost ratio, BCR, and was justified in that right. The project followed on from the Limerick regeneration plan and it was very much in that context that the scheme was funded. It is only in recent times that we have received documentation where the scheme was then being referred to as the northern distributor road phase 1. It was never presented to us originally in that format.

In terms of the contract and what is happening, they are in fact going to do some emergency works, in particular on the bridge over the railway and certain other emergency works, which they hope to do very quickly. At the moment it will probably be a negotiated tender. I mean that they will go to a small number of tenders to do this and it is not the rest of the job by any means. As they prepare plans they must measure what is there and create a new contract for the rest.