Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 1 July 2021

Committee on Budgetary Oversight

Capital Investment: Department of Public Expenditure and Reform

Mr. Ronnie Downes:

I know people criticise the rigour and may say that it is too rigorous but it is important that there are stages in the process of public development where we get the Department, the sponsoring authority, whatever it might be, to say here is what the project is, here is the business case and here is the cost that we are bringing to the Government for approval. For that cost, in turn, we have introduced an external peer review mechanism in order that the factors associated with the cost can be evaluated and there can be an informed judgment about the cost plus risk and the pricing to be associated with that risk. That should in turn -----