Mr. John Kinnane:

On the multi-annual budgeting aspect, we set out multi-annual capital ceilings in the capital plan. Given the long-term nature of capital projects and the need to have a pipeline in place, Departments require a high degree of certainty. That informs the approach towards capital budgeting.

With regard to the allocation of funding to current expenditure programmes, each year we set out the multi-annual expenditure ceilings but the reality is what gets set out on a technical basis is a ceiling for a Department that is in line with the current year's ceiling. The ceiling published for the Department of Rural and Community Development for next year would be the same as this year's expenditure allocation in the Revised Estimates Volume. At budget time, that allows the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform along with the Ministers of the relevant line Departments to enter into a discussion about priorities for the following year. Decisions are made on allocations and increased allocations at a departmental level. Departments have multi-annual funding in place in that a ceiling, which is at the same level as the current year's ceiling, is set out but any incremental increase requires agreement during the budgetary process. That has served us reasonably well in providing flexibility to respond to the evolving situations seen over the past number of years.

The delivery of the programmes is the responsibility of the line Departments, but when it comes to whether funding has been spent during the year, we at an aggregate level report with the Department of Finance each month on spending by Departments. We review the various sections within the Department of Public Expenditure that deal with the relevant and respective line Departments. We go through the expenditure on a monthly basis, identifying areas where there may be underspends or overspends, and that would feed into discussions with regard to allocations for further years.