Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

One might get sick of saying some of this stuff. As Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport I have responsibility for overall policy and funding for the national roads programme. The implementation of individual national road projects is a matter for the National Roads Authority, NRA, under the Roads Acts 1993 to 2007, in conjunction with the local authorities concerned. The improvement and maintenance of regional and local roads is the statutory responsibility of each local authority in accordance with the provisions of section 13 of the Roads Act 1993. Works on those roads are funded from local authorities from their own resources, supplemented by State road grants.

The amount of public funding available for the road network has reduced significantly over the last number of years and the amount of money available does not match the work that needs to be done. In these circumstances the NRA and local authorities have to focus primarily on the maintenance and rehabilitation of roads and to try to use available resources as effectively as possible. It is worth noting, however, that an additional €50 million under a mini-stimulus plan was provided to local authorities in June this year for works on regional and local roads, and much good work was done over the summer and autumn with that money. A further €50 million has been announced for next year. This funding for next year means that the intended cut of €116 million under the roads capital budget for 2014 will now be a smaller adjustment of €66 million. All this will not come from the maintenance side as the specific and strategic improvement grants have been suspended, although there will be a further cut to maintenance of local and regional roads next year. This remains a very challenging reduction but every effort will be made to make the most out of the very limited resources.

Funding for the NRA will increase next year, with capital funding increasing from €278 million to €308 million, with current funding increasing from €40.4 million to €41 million. That amounts to over €20 million of an increase for the NRA next year, taking account of the fact that work is under way at the Newlands Cross and N11 sites. It is hoped that work will start on the Gort to Tuam project in the new year.

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