Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I will deal with the issue of roads in general. We never have enough money for roads. The general Exchequer situation means that we do not have the allocations we want. We accept that and are trying to do the best we can with what we have. Given the budget constraints and the impact of reduced maintenance spending, the Minister, Deputy Varadkar, and I decided to channel all available resources to maintenance and rehabilitation work to protect the investment that has been made. This means that funding for major construction or realignment of schemes for regional and local roads has been discontinued. In recent weeks, we have found an extra €50 million for regional and local roads, which was badly needed, and I welcome it. We also put forward a pilot community involvement scheme. I note Deputy Tom Fleming's comments go both ways on this in supporting it and suggesting people cannot take the burden. However, it does not need to be a financial contribution and can be in other forms also. We will see how that goes. We are trying to get more with less with the budget we have.

Deputy Dooley has said it is hard to justify the level of funding but we simply do not have the money. In the national recovery plan published by the previous Government the total funding allocated to roads over the period was less than we are giving. From that point of view we are putting in more than the previous Government thought was feasible, but it still is not enough. We need to work as much as possible with local authorities and we are trying our best.

We need to support the local authorities that are doing their best. While they get substantial funding from central government, they also have their own means of funding. Some local authorities contribute considerable funding towards their local roads and others do not. I believe we should give more support to those that are making a greater contribution. It is depressing that some local authorities have actually dropped their allocation substantially while depending on the Exchequer for more funding. Given the extent of the road network which is considerably beyond the European norm, we are doing our best with the funds we have. We are trying a few schemes and we are closing out a number of projects. At national level we are trying a number of public private partnerships, PPPs, as everyone is aware.