Francis Noel Duffy (Dublin South West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Is there anything relative to our population increase? Last year, the population of Ireland was recorded as 5 million people. While my son was studying for his junior certificate examined, he learned that in 1997 there was only 3.7 million people living in this country so the population has increased by 38% in 25 years. Has the increase in population stretched our capacity? I ask because it takes a while to build capacity. I know capacity was built up very quickly in the noughties. I assume that the pace of increase will continue and could increase by 50% in the next 25 years. Will we find it difficult to keep pace? I apologise for asking such a strange question.