Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The reason for the underspend is that it was the first year and staffing was an issue. I will give the statistics. As per the quarter 3 report from the NTA supplied to my Department, 92 new positions have been filled across local authorities out of a total of about 250 allowed. This includes staff in local authorities outside of the greater Dublin area and regional cities, where, until this year, there were no NTA-funded active travel staff in place. In the coming weeks, the NTA will provide its quarter 4 report on the resourcing plan where we expect a significant increase in the number of positions filled. There will be a lot of pressure on local authorities next year. Now that they have increased resources in-house, we expect them to be able to roll out these active travel projects across the country. I will get the Deputy the exact figures in regard to his earlier question and I will provide them to him separately.

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