Mr. Kevin Meaney:

One of the key tasks in our phase 1 report related to examining the demand side. We reached out to both the Departments and the sectors to assess the demands over the coming ten years and what they considered to be their key priorities. We also conducted a public consultation, in which we received more than 570 submissions, and many of the key demands and priorities the public foresee in the next ten years were set out. In carrying out the phase 1 report, we had also to consider supply-side issues. We recognise that in the past two or three years, elements of the construction sector indicate some plateauing of employment and perhaps increases in wages and prices, which indicate that there are some supply-side constraints.

On the work of the ESRI, in some ways we fully accept that there is evidence of some constraints. Nevertheless, with the process of the NDP review, we are trying to give the construction sector greater certainty as to where capital budgets will be over a ten-year period. One goal we have in the Department is to set that at a sustainable level of total capital funding over a ten-year period, which, we hope, will allow the construction sector to grow and meet the requirements of the public sector.

We also have some ongoing initiatives with the construction sector to examine how the sector can increase supply, such as one relating to communication to foster industry confidence, which is one of the key goals of the NDP. We are working with the construction sector on the skills pipeline and with our colleagues in the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science on an apprenticeship action plan, which I believe will be finalised this year. Through our construction sector group, we ourselves are leading a drive for construction sector innovation and digital adoption, and we are leading on a number of initiatives with our construction sector colleagues to examine how innovation, effectiveness and efficiency within sectors can be enhanced. Plenty of policies to increase supply, therefore, are ongoing.