Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

The primary purpose of the document from the viewpoint of the Department of Finance was to raise the question about whether we should establish a sovereign fund. It largely made the case for doing so. In passing, the document makes reference to the fact that we have significant demographic pressures as well as a requirement to invest in climate and digital. However, that was not the sole focus of the document so I would not read it as the be-all and end-all of what we are going to do. I do agree with the broad strategy of establishing a sovereign fund to manage some of the excess windfall gains we are getting from corporation tax at the moment.

There will be other plans and other occasions where we can look at some of the more strategic transport investments. The strategic rail review is due out soon. It depends on what happens in Stormont but we know it will have to go to a strategic environmental assessment this summer, so we will be able to share it on that basis. That will bring to the fore questions of long-term structural investment decisions about rail freight and the development of rail infrastructure. However, we are not just waiting for that review. There is significant investment under way.

I accept what was said earlier about the delays in the planning system. That being said, we have a huge number of projects now ready to go, including BusConnects, MetroLink, DART+ and the Cork metropolitan rail network. I could keep going. As soon as these projects come out of the planning system, we will start building and spending. We are not sitting idle. We have made significant investments in new inter-city rail carriages, ICR, which will go into service next year. We have also invested massively in new battery electric trains. These will go into service in the next few years. The overcrowding issue on the Sligo train that was mentioned will be significantly reduced by the additional rail capacity.

I agree with the Deputy that we will have to increase our capital expenditure. The Department received a €35 billion allocation from the NDP. This was the largest allocation so it is not as if we do not have capital resources. We also have the projects' detailed business cases. Even though we have a drawn-out public procurement process, we have projects ready to go and as soon as they start coming out of the planning process, we will start building.