Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Tánaiste. My core point is that direct Exchequer funding of capital investment needs to be ambitiously complemented by additional investment through public private partnerships and the role of the strategic investment fund. Instead of looking at the fund with a view to putting it into the rainy day fund, the Government needs to ensure that the transition of the fund into Irish investment, from the global portfolio with more than €6 billion, must be accelerated. There are projects in every Department and in every part of this country that could be implemented and commenced on commercial terms. The fundamental point is that we are in exceptionally benign times in the context of the investment market. We are raising money at negative interest rates for the first time in our history as far as I am aware. Now is the time to lock in investment at those favourable terms because I can assure the Tánaiste of one thing; those terms will not last forever. Now is the time to do it. There is no point in coming back to the well in a few years' time when we are paying multiples of what we currently pay on interest rates. I ask that the Government explores these avenues in an ambitious way. It will find support from our party in respect of the budget and the investment plan, if it does this in a meaningful and tangible way.

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