Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

With regard to the cabinet committee dealing with infrastructure, the cost of many projects is now significantly ahead of what was stated when the current national development plan was prepared. For example, today's newspapers report that a review of water projects indicates that costs are running, on average, 15% ahead of what was previously stated. Some projects are below budget but the significant majority are well ahead of estimates. Adding this to the other well-established overruns, such as those in the national children's hospital and the national broadband plan, the obvious question arises of when we will see a full review of timings and projects in the national development plan. I would appreciate it if the Taoiseach could give an answer to that specific question.

We have not received a satisfactory reply on the resignation of the Government's chief procurement officer from the hospital board. What is his role and his views on the children's hospital? Surely the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform has ascertained those views on the specific project.

The overall point is that nobody can stand over a position where public money is being spent making claims about all the projects that will be delivered for a set amount of money while at the same time the Government knows the indicated funding is not there at all for these projects. When the national development plan was launched, we were promised regular updates and full transparency but in recent days all we are getting is more repeated announcements of already promised projects. When will the promised review of national development plan costs and timing be published?

My question concerned climate change but United States President Donald Trump would have been proud of the Taoiseach's recent comments on climate change. President Trump comes out saying things like we should not worry about climate change because we will have warmer winters and fewer people will die as a result. Perhaps the Taoiseach did not intend his comments as such but that is almost in the denial category. We could have far worse and more frequent storms, and this has already cost lives. Perhaps it could cost much more in future winters. I do not know what is going on in the Taoiseach's press office but apparently sources have said that Fine Gael Deputies will "roast" the Greens slowly on the barbecue. That nonsensical sort of behaviour must stop.

I asked about electric cars last week and I read a recent editorial in The Irish Timesmaking a similar point. Nobody believes the target set by the Government on take-up of electric cars as we would already need to see dramatically more electric vehicles being sold than we are to have a chance of reaching that target. We lack the basic infrastructure to achieve anything close to that target. Has the Taoiseach reviewed the target, taking in the new information that has emerged around the lack of credibility in the numbers announced earlier this year? Nobody, and not even those in the Department, is standing over that figure it seems. The information coming from the Department is such that nobody attaches credibility to the figure.

See this speech in context